Bourne Again
by The wander
Summary: What if Xander had gone to Walsh with his problems before finding out she was evil. This is now complete.
1. Chapter 1

Title: Bourne Again

Author: Robert Jackson

Email: to archive: yes, just let me know where.

Pairing/Characters: None as yet, but will be a F/X

Rating: R

Summary:What if Jason Bourne was Xander. Takes place after the BourneSupremacy, Have not read the books.

Warnings: Death, assassinations

Xanderhad been seeing Professor Walsh for a few months now.

He had been stressed out lately, and the dreams were coming back. Four years with no breaks, it takes a toll on the soul. And he really never had anyone to talk to about it. He had thought of going to Giles, but always at the last minute he would chicken out, justifying that something more important was always going on. And then Giles was fired from the Council and he never really recovered from that, and Xander really didn't want to put anything more on the poor man.

And the others, they were living their lives, too, getting used to college, making new friends. Hell, it seems that Buffy met a new guy everyday from the way she talked. And Willow, she was in her element.

And there was no way he was going to go to Joyce with this - she had to deal with having a daughter that was a Slayer. The bad dreams of her daughter's friend just didn't measure up to it.

And to top it off, if he did say something, he would most likely pushed out again. And there was no way he wanted that to happen again. So, when he heard about Professor Walsh, it was perfect. Someone who was a professional, who knew about the mind. And the big thing was she wouldn't tell the others. And she knew about the night life of Sunnydale.

The meetings began as a 'get to know you' thing. But it was getting better. Within a few weeks, she had moved her once a week meetings that lasted only 30 minutes with him to 3 times a week and for an hour on each visit. Xander told her about his working with Buffy, how he met her, how he helped her. And he told her about the possessions, the Hyena, the Soldier, even about the swim team.

In those few weeks, Walsh learned more about demons and magic than in her entire time in Sunnydale, and with the information she planned out Adam: what she needed, what she didn't, to make him the best she could.

She was also interested in Ethan Rayne, the chaos mage. He could be of use to a sister origination, Treadstone 71. Plans had been in the works for a while, but had problems with conditioning agents: they were a bit unstable. But with Rayne, they would be able to have the perfect agents in days, not the months it took now. And they would be the perfect assassins.

How could you normally find someone that was just a construct of mental attributes? They would have no predictability, would fit in anywhere in the world and never question orders. You could even pick a local and within a few short hours, you would have a loyal agent to carry out any mission you needed.

And now, at long last, it looked like Treadstone would get a go ahead. Last night, Ethan had been captured. He had come to Sunnydale and had cast a spell on Rupert Giles last night. The terror she had felt last night, when the unemployed librarian was turned into a demon and chased her down the street, would now all be worth it. She had the mage now and soon he would be gone. Not before she had him ruffed up a little, though. Just an accident in transport, it happened all the time.

Plus, she would have the boy, who she knew wouldn't be missed from her observations and Agent Finn's reports. The group of civilian hunters had been pushing him out. Who would miss him? He would be long gone to the Washington training grounds.

And her covert group, the ones that handle the questionable problems, that she couldn't trust Finn to do, could plant all the evidence that she needed to make it look like he left.

She just needed timing. And it looked like the time was right.

Flash back

Buffy and Willow stood around the dinner table. They had planned this all out. Tonight was the night. Xander wouldn't be allowed to go on patrols anymore. He had almost gotten killed the night before. And since he was the only one able to get a job, and had any kind of future, he was out.

Dawn was out with Riley and Tara, at the movies. Neither one knew what was happing tonight, only that they were asked to watch Dawn while they had it out with Xander. It was big, that was all they knew.

All but Xander, who walking into a fight without even knowing it.

"Hey guys." Xander said as he walked into the house. "Sorry I'm late. But those pesky bosses don't let people off just to meet with their friends."

"Hey Xan," Willow said, looking a little guilty.

"Xander," Buffy said, "we need to talk."

"About what?" Xander asked he could see something was coming, what he didn't know, but there was something bad coming his way.

"Xan, We don't think you need to patrol anymore," Buffy said quickly. "You can still help with the research, you and Anya would still be part of the group. But you don't need to put yourself in danger anymore."

"Buff," Xander said, getting pissed, "Where the hell is this coming from?"

"We have Riley and the rest of the soldiers. We even have Spike," Buffy continued.

"So?" Xander asked, "Where were they when you needed me to help out with the Mayor?"

"Xander, you have done great things," Willow said. "You're important to us. We don't want to see you hurt."

"So it's ok if I see you hurt?" Xander said looking at the girls. "It's ok if you die while I sit back here and watch TV?"

"No, but is it fair that Anya is going to find out that you are dead one night because you couldn't keep up with us?"

"Buffy," Xander said looking at her in the eye, "Screw you. I was there for you every time you needed me, and now that you've got Riley I'm being sidelined? Where was he when I gave you CPR in the Master's cave? Where were they when I pulled you out the water before the swim team got you? Huh? Where were they when you took off for the summer? Not here. I was. I have done more for you than almost anyone else and this is how you treat me?"

"Xander, don't make this personal." Buffy begged.

"No, Buffy, it's very personal. My friends don't want me around."

"Yes, we do!" Willow said, "We even want Anya, too."

"Will, when was the last time you saw Anya?" Xander asked.

"Uh, just a little while ago?"

"Yes, it was a little while ago," Xander said, looking down on his oldest friend. "Anya moved out of Sunnydale a month and half ago. She said something about moving to LA. She met a dancer at some club."

"Xander?" Willow said. How could she not have known about this?

"No!" Xander snapped, bringing both girls up short. "You know what? I'm through. I have stood by both of you. And you know what? You're right, I have been giving up on a life, just to be here. So I'm done. The next time the world is coming to an end, don't call." Then he paused. "Why am I telling you that? That's just what you're going to do, anyway."

And with that, he left two speechless girls behind.

"When he calms down, we will go talk to him," Buffy tell her redheaded friend.

"Yea, that should be next year," Willow said, getting up and walking out of the room.

It would be the last time they would see him for a very long time.

End flash back.

"Yes," Walsh was saying looking over at the young man. "I see what happened."

"I am just so tired." Xander said, "The nightmares about the war, then no one to listen to me. If it wasn't for you, I would have gone crazy."

"I have just what you need," Walsh said, opening a drawer in her desk. She pulled out a bottle of blue pills. Opening the container, she handed Xander three pills and a small glass of water.

"Take these and you'll feel better. They're anti-stress pills."

"Thanks, doc," Xander said as he downed the pills. And within minutes, Xander was unconscious.

Looking over the drugged man, Walsh pulled out her cell phone and dialed a number from memory.

"I've got one for you. He already has some conditioning with the new process," Walsh said, watching the boy. Too bad. He was a nice kid, but you had to break eggs sometimes. "Yes, he is ready to transport."

Ethan Rayne stood over the boy. He recalled seeing him in Sunnydale, one of Ripper's brats. He had already gone through the others. Thirty-two people now were weapons for the American government.

And now this boy. He had a list of people/personality traits that the bosses here wanted in this boy's heads. Only this one already had a start on them. And there was something else. A sliver of Primal energy. Not really enough to do anything, just bring out dark impulsive actions.

But it was a start.

He had been told what he was to place in this boy's mind, but unlike the others he would add a little more. He was a agent of chaos, wasn't he? And this boy would just be perfect.

Ethan set up the spell, the items he needed were in place. And soon the spell would be in effect. But he put a few twists on it.

He revived what primal energy was left. But not too much; just enough to give him a edge. Not that he really cared one way or the other. But he might come across Ripper again, and he didn't want it being said that he didn't help his kids. There was no telling what Ripper would do to him if he didn't help this boy.

He knew he couldn't get him out, or himself for that matter, so he did what he could. He pushed a lawyer, history teacher, computer programmers/hackers and many more into the boy's head. By the time he was finished with the boy, he was a master of weapons and could slip smoothly into any place in the world.

And with that Xander Harris disappeared... At least for a little while.

10 years later.

New York City

Pamela Landry was sitting at her desk on a sunny day, wishing she could get out of the paper work. She was still working on it from that cluster fuck in Europe. She had feelers out looking for Bourne but he had just disappeared like the ghost he was.

Then her phone rang and that familiar voice came across it.

Bourne.

"I hear you're still looking for me." Bourne was speaking in a calm voice. Pamela knew he could be anywhere around the world, so she didn't hit the call trace alarm on her desk.

"Bourne?" she asked knowing full well who it was. She just couldn't think of anything else to say.

"What do you want?" Bourne's voice had gone from calm to cold in a second.

"I wanted to thank you... For the tape," Pamela said.

It was a big thing for her to thank someone. She never really did that in her whole career. She did what was needed or right and didn't care about what happened or who had got hurt; it was part of the job. Sure, she would hunt someone to the ends of the earth for hurting one her people, but in the long run, she never really cared. So her admitting this was a big thing.

"We got what we needed. It's all tied off. It's over."

"I guess I owe you an apology," Pamela continued after a pause.

"Is that official?" Bourne asked.

"No. It's off the record. You know how it is."

"Goodbye," Bourne said. He had found out what he wanted to know and now it was time to be moving on.

"Wait. Wait!" Pamela called over the phone. She was digging through a file on her desk.

"Alexander Harris. That's your real name. You were born in Sunnydale, California. Why don't you come in and we'll talk about it."

When Pamela said the name, Bourne felt something. A flash of red hair. A blonde girl smiling. And a dark haired girl telling him she was going to show him around the curves. Then nothing.

"Bourne?" Pamela asked over the phone when he didn't say anything.

"Get some rest, Pam. You looked tired."

And with that he hung up the phone and walked away, while Pamela spun around and looked out the window of her office.

He had been watching her again.

From: "robert jackson" grey. Bourne reworked

Date: Thursday, July 27, 2006 4:21 PM

Hey re worked it, added more into the fight, Tell me what you think.

Part 2

Alexander Harris.

That was his name.

But it didn't seem right. He had Bourne for so long that was all he could

think of himself as. He had been other names, other people, at various

times but he always had returned to Bourne.

He had been in LA for a three weeks now, tracking down leads. He couldn't

return to Sunnydale, because it was gone. Just a hole in the ground.

There were a few survivors here and there, but mostly they were just gone.

It was like no one wanted to even remember or be associated with the town.

He, at first, thought it might be another set up by Pamela, but got the

feeling from the last conversation with her that she was talking straight

with him and would wait for him to contact her.

What records he could find on the town were strange. Murders and

disappearances were common place, but not a thing was reported on the local

news or to the outside law enforcement agencies. People just seemed to fall

off the planet in that town, but all the ones that disappeared were marked

with a government marker, from a debunked group that had been around since

at least the 1940's. With all that was going on in that town, it was like a

war was going on, but no one knew it was happening. And from what little he

had found so far, he had been in the middle of it.

It took him another week to track down any solid records for himself. First

there were his medical records. They had been put into a missing persons

data base.

Looking it over, he decided that he had had a hard life. Possibly child

abuse, what looked like gang fighting, numerous accounts about 'Gangs on

PCP.' He also found later police records on himself - fights, domestic

disturbances, nothing to brought in about, but enough to keep a record of.

But what was really odd was when he hit a stone wall; the military had a

file on him.

It was mostly blacked out, but there were odd words here and there in the

file: Slayer, watcher, demon, witch, and a few names - Buffy, Riley and

Willow.

Nothing rang a distinct bell, but their was a faint feeling, of

friendship... or maybe love? There was also a list of files at the bottom.

Most were dead ends. Just the same files over and over, but on one was a

link to something else.

There was a maze of servers involved and he had to hack through them. The

security on them was impressive - like hacking into the Pentagon, only more

so.

Bourne was not taking any chances, so he picked up a modified laptop before

his run on these files. He also jumped and wove his way through a few

systems before he started actually hacking, using whatever cover and

blockage he could find in cyberspace before moving in after the files. His

last line defense was his location, a little cyber-Coffee shop, one that had

a wireless hook up to the internet, but the shop was also overlaid with

three other businesses that each had a wireless hookup. The place had also

been used by hacker's for years as a base of operations, so no one would

think twice about a hacker raiding a system from here.

The system was amazing, full of security traps, and password protected

areas, and roving programs asking for passwords at random times. After a

fast look though the basic directories, he came to the conclusion this place

was a Council database.

The Council of Watchers. It had all the fingerprints of the COW, one of the

few groups that had a hands off warning with every agency he'd worked with.

He didn't know why, but the very few that went up against them had

disappeared. He had fulfilled a few missions for them, taking care of

someone getting too close to them - a man here, a woman there. He had even

met the boss, Travers.

But soon, he found what he was after: his files.

The first files were school records. At first, he could not believe he was

the same guy described in them, the grades were just so low. But then he

looked at the classes that he was in at the time. They were for the

advanced students; he had been placed with the school brains.

Why? His parents should have moved him out of those classes, if his grades

were that low, into classes more his speed. But then, from the evidence he

had found so far, he didn't have much of a home life and his parents must

not have cared much about his schooling as long as he was gone.

Where did that thought come from? Bourne thought to himself as he read

from the screen.

He found more government markers here and there in the records for the

school. Notes about class mates. But now some were marked as HST's, along

with more marked as KIA. His file was marked with a MIA, a 'Hold if found,'

and 'Kill if compromised.' Compromised? What did that mean? How could he

have been compromised? He was a student, wasn't he? After he finished his

file, he noticed one labeled 'Dana.'

That name always had meant something to me.

Flash Back

He was in LA. Not his usual area, since he mostly worked in Europe and Asia

, but he would pull other missions as needed. He was the 'go to' guy. Any

mission, anywhere, he did the impossible and came home with a few new

nightmares.

Which were taken care of with more sessions/visits to Treadstone.

Secrets must stay secret, after all.

He watched as a group of girls led by a blond man took another girl, who was

tied down on a gurney, from a second group of armed men. As he watched, the

leader drew himself up and turned to walk away, his steps angry. He could

vaguely recall meeting that guy, somewhere. They had stood face to face in

a hospital somewhere. Bourne was guarding someone; who, exactly, he

couldn't recall, but someone important even if he couldn't recall a name or

even a face. But they had been on opposite sides of the fight, and that was

all that mattered.

Stepping out of the shadows, the girls drew up sharply when they saw him.

None of them had sensed him there.

"Andrew," Bourne said, looking at the smaller man, "You ready?"

"Yes," Andrew said, looking nervously at the girls. It was a 'now or never'

thing happening here. "Ladies, go back to the hotel."

"Andrew, who's this guy?" the lead woman asked, her hand reaching under her

jacket holding something.

"No one," Andrew said to her. "I am doing what Mr. Giles wants done. Just

go back to the hotel and await contact."

Bourne looked over at the girls as they moved around. Each were fighters

and all seemed armed. But their movements seemed familiar, they moved like

someone he had known, but he couldn't quite place it.

Soon, it was just Andrew and the girl. She had been tied down to a gurney

earlier and injected with something that had quieted her down.

"Y...y...you got my money?" the nerdy little man asked. "I want to be long

gone before the Watchers find out about this."

"It's in the car," Bourne said, looking at the man. He'd had to deal with

more than one turncoat in his life, and they always left him feeling dirty.

And this man sold out his organization and a sick woman at the same time for

a little money.

He was just scum.

"Teach them to walk all over me," Andrew was muttering as he walked to the

car. "I did good and walked the road of redemption. And they look down on

me. Use me. What am I? None of them like me. Always talking down to me,

treating me like a Ferengi."

Bourne just looked the small man. Walking behind the man, Bourne signaled

to a van that pulled up and placed the girl in the back.

"Be careful with Dana, she's dangerous," Andrew warmed as they reached the

car.

"We will. She will be well taken care of," Bourne said.

"Good, I don't want her hurt," Andrew said. "At least, not more than she

has to be. So where's the money?"

"Back here." Bourne said opening the trunk of the car, then moving out of

the way and letting the small man to look in. At the very back of the

compartment sat a bag. As Andrew reached into grab the bag, he felt

something hard on the back of his head, then nothing.

Bourne looked around as he replaced his silenced pistol back under his

jacket. Pushing the body into the truck, he got into the driver seat, making

a phone call on his cell as he did.

"Everything went as planed, package en route. Loose end was tightened.

Will drop car off at cleaners, then return to base." Then Bourne hung the

phone up, on his way to drop off the car at the cleaners. He threw the

phone into the bay as he passed over it on the bridge.

End Flashback

Dana was part of Black Briar, at least that was what the files he had hunted

up said. But what Black Briar was, he had no idea. His mind could almost

think of something he should know about Black Briar – it seemed to be at the

edge of his memories, but just as he thought he might remember, his laptop

beeped at him.

Someone was tracking him. A group of someones. Each one was hitting a

different server at the same time, but they were too well coordinated to be

on their own.

They were good; Bourne was killing tracking programs as fast he could,

trying to get all the information he could about himself from those files,

but the trio were getting closer. He would have to drop the line soon. He

was just waiting for the last of files to be copied on to the laptop.

These COWs were good, they just seem to jump from server to server. They

just seemed to know where he was, and none of the false trails he had laid

were going to work. Then they had him.

He figured he had at least 20 minutes before anyone would show. And they

thought he didn't know about them. The COW programmers went out of their

way not to cut his line, so that meant their people on their way here. The

programs he used were the cutting edge, and they allowed him to track

tracking programs that had hooked on to his data trail.

He had just finished and shut down his laptop and was preparing to leave

when a young woman ran into the coffee shop. She was completely out of

place here – the people in the room looked like they never got out in the

sun and wore black clothes mixed with hand-me-downs. Most of them really

didn't care what they looked like, since their lives were on the net, not in

this mundane world.

So this little goddess that came in stuck out; while the people in the

coffee shop looked like they had just picked up clothing off the floor, this

girl looked like she was all set to go out clubbing. She was also tanned

and fit - again not something you could say about the regulars here.

The young girl's eyes - they were off, didn't fit her face. They were the

eyes of a hunter, someone who had seen too much too soon. He knew that

look, it was the same one he had in his eyes every morning before he slid on

which ever mask he'd need that day. The girl scanned the crowd looking for

someone, anyone with a computer. Fortunately, he had already stashed his

away in a back pack before she had looked at him.

Damn Bourne thought as he moved out. Less than five minutes to get here.

They must have been right on top of me.

He knew he didn't fit with the crowd here either, and with the young woman

at the door and another moving up behind her, he headed out the back.

But if these girls were the COWs… It didn't make sense. They only had one

female agent in the field at a time. And those had only one back-up agent,

a man called a watcher, if his intelligence had been correct. He was

usually older and stayed out of the line of fire. These two girls had the

look of girls that the COWs used, but not the operational training they had.

A major shake up must have happened in their group.

Hitting the alley and heading for the street, he heard a refined voice call

from behind him.

"Going somewhere?"

Bourne stopped and turned to see a young man standing behind him. English,

and he also held himself like someone who knew how to fight but hardly ever

did it. Back up. The Watcher, with a bulge in his jacket showing that he

was carrying something. What it was, he couldn't make out. Not a gun and

too big to be a knife. A stun stick?

"Just late for work," Bourne said, a disarming smile on his face.

"I'm sure," the man said. "Someone was looking into some files that

belonged to a friend of ours."

"Hmm," Bourne said. "Sorry don't know anything about it."

He started to once again move away from the man. He knew he needed to get

away from the English guy, before his two girls showed up. If they did, he

would be out of luck. The girls that the Watchers used were trained from

birth to fight from all records he had seen on them.

"Sorry, want to try again?" the English guy held up a small stone that was

glowing. "This little thing says you're lying."

What the hell? Bourne thought. Magic. He had seen and heard of magic

over the years, who hadn't, but it was rare. Not many magic users went into

the services, they were just too independent. To have one using a spell on

you in an alley will bring you up short.

"Why were you looking into places you shouldn't have been looking?" the man

said as he walked toward Bourne. Just as the man got within arm's reach,

his cell phone beeped.

It was all the distraction Bourne needed. He struck out, a fast blow across

the throat, that left the Englishman gagging. Then another fast blow

driving him to the ground, unconscious.

Once he was on the ground, Bourne pulled out the man's cell. Pulling the

cover from the back of the phone, he plugged a small box into the phone.

Lights along the top of the box flashed as it copied all the information

from the phone's data store, copying the ID tag for the phone, along with

all the numbers and any text messages there as well.

It had taken only seconds, he was done with the phone dropping it back into

the guys jacket and was heading down the alley. Moving at a fast pace but

still slow enough that no one would notice him.

He had almost made it out of the alley way when three figures moved into it.

It was the young women from inside the coffee shop, and they had picked up

another girl. While the two that had gone inside looked like they were

going clubbing, this one looked like she just jumped off the back of a

motorcycle, all leather and steel.

But then, she looked all of 15, if that.

"Book boy?" the leader called out as they moved into the alley. "You got

him?"

All three stopped as they stepped out of the little bit of light that shone

down from the streets and became aware of the body that was laid out, and of

Bourne.

"Ohh," the leader said looking at Bourne. "This going to hurt you."

With that, the three girls moved in on him. Someone had hurt their Watcher,

and he was going to pay.

Only it didn't go quite as they thought it would. Sandy, the first to reach

Bourne, kicked at him, only to find her would-be victim already moving. He

grabbed her leg and pulled her off balance. She would later swear his eyes

flashed a little green as he moved past her to engage the other girls.

Becky, the leather girl, pulled a dagger from behind her back. She had just

gotten into LA a little while ago, straight from The Joyce Summers School

for Girls in Cleveland. Rhonda had been here a while but they hadn't worked

together for long and it showed. They almost hit each other as they moved

in on Bourne, who used it to his advantage. Both girls went in for the fast

kill, only to tangle up in each other's arms. Becky dropped her dagger so

not to hurt her fellow Slayer, only to have her arm grabbed and pushed into

Sandy, who was just getting her balance back, sending both to the ground.

Rhonda moved in for the kill. There was no way a normal was going to win;

she just knew it. She was a Slayer, after all.

Just then, Bourne spun around to face the girl. Rhonda had never seen eyes

as lifeless as the ones looking at her right then. She had seen Vamps with

more humanity; these eyes were just blank. Then she felt the knee drive up

and into her stomach, driving out her breath. There was another blow to her

face, then she was on her back, gasping for breath. It was so unexpected,

this normal looking guy could hit, and move. Bourne was using a mish mash of

martial arts, in a kind of anything-that-works style. The Slayers had been

overconfident that they could take on anything. But most of what they

fought over the years had been demons, ones that relied on brute strength,

not someone trained to use your strengths against you. Gasping for breath

and trying to get up, Becky watched as Bourne moved in on her sister

Slayers, who were trying to untangle their arms and legs to get up.

She could appreciate the movement, even if she didn't like what was

happening. The guy was a stone cold killer. And right now they were his

targets. Getting her breath back, Rhonda jumped at Bourne from behind,

grabbing him. He also had underestimated the girls. He knew of the training

they got, but was not ready for actually fighting with one, much less three.

And he also didn't want to hurt them - that part of his life was over.

As Rhonda locked her arm around Bourne's neck, Becky and Sandy had untangled

themselves and were getting up. This was going downhill fast for Bourne and

he knew it. He would have to end this soon. He kept missing finishing hits,

because he didn't want to kill the girls. But if they pushed it too much, his

body would start to react to the blows the girls were throwing and someone

would be hurt or killed. With each blow he received, the weight of his pistol

was becoming more and more evident. And truth be told, if it came down to

him or these girls, the girls would lose. He wasn't happy about that, but it

was the truth, even if a small voice in his head was telling him that killing

them was wrong.

With one girl on his back and the other two moving up on him, he did

something unexpected. Twisting his body about, he slammed back to the ground

putting every thing into driving the woman on his back into the pavement.

Just as the two other women got to them, he kicked out with both legs, one

hitting one woman, while the other hit the other woman. One hit the lead

girl driving the breath from her, leaving her gasping, but due to the

leather jacket, not doing the same to the other. But he did dive her back

enough to move again.

Rhonda was still seeing stars from when her head had hit the pavement and felt

Bourne move off of her, not really understanding what it meant. She only

knew that her head hurt, and water from some alley drain was in her hair.

Sandy was bent over trying to keep her lunch down, at the same time trying

to get her breath back in her lungs, while Becky moved in once again on

Bourne. Becky had learned how to fight when she became a Slayer, and she

learned how to win when she was a student with Faith.

As Becky moved in, Bourne did a side kick into her side, knocking her back

again. Just as Rhonda was getting herself back together, Becky moved in

again and traded blows with Bourne, both blocking each other. Small blows

would slip in, but neither one could get a blow in with much force, just enough

to knock the other around a bit. Rhonda was back on her feet and Sandy had

just got her breath back, when Bourne side-kicked as he moved to face the

other two slayers, driving his foot into the side of Becky's knee, causing

it to bend at an angle it was not meant to bend. Becky screamed and dropped

to the ground, holding her knee and tears ran down her face.

Bourne turned to face the other two girls, blood running down from his nose

and mouth from the blows from Becky. Rhonda looked at Becky then steeled

herself, Sandy was at a loss. They were Slayers; he was human. How could he

be doing this?

Sandy took a fast glance at Rhonda, then both moved in on Bourne.

Bourne was hurting. These women were good. Now he was facing off with two.

He felt like his lungs were on fire, pain radiated from his nose, and lips.

He could feel a few loose teeth, he thought his nose might be broken and his

ribs were hurting. But he couldn't give up.

Sandy went low while Rhonda went high. Bourne sidestepped them both and

brought his knee up smashing it into Sandy's face. He could feel her nose give

as his knee cap hit, and he knew it was broken. T he girl fell back on her ass

grabbing her face, as Rhonda moved. A blow caught him across the jaw sending

him spinning to the ground. Then she stopped to look at her sister Slayer.

Yep. Loose teeth, Bourne thought looking at the girl. He needed to finish

this fast. He kick jumped to his feet and then lashed out with his foot in a

round house kick driving Rhonda to the ground, then pulled his pistol.

Turning and moving toward his gear, he kept all three women in his line of

sight.

"I'll be going." He said looking over the women.

Bourne stood back and paused as he looked at the three women. No, the three

girls. He had hurt them. He looked down at the leather girl, a greenish

glow in his eyes. She had dark hair and a lost look on her face. She knew

he was going to hurt her again. He stepped toward her and she unconsciously

let out a whimper, pulling back. Blood covered her face from a smashed

nose. She could feel it in the back of her throat.

Bourne looked at the girl, and he could feel that dark part of himself stir.

That instinct, the part that had kept him alive for all these years. It

wanted the girls; to rape them, kill them, dominate them, make them his.

But Marie was there in his head. Her calm love of him drove the dark part

back. He was not this thing; he was better. He would not slide back into

that darkness. It was in the past. He could recall bit and pieces from his

past now, more and more of the evil that he had done. He had kept them all

locked away in a dream journal, warded an ideal of Marie. He had needed it

to help control his nightmares, and because of it, he now could recall

chunks of his life as an agent.

But nothing before that. No family. No friends. Just a black life. That

was why he was digging into his life, to find out who he was.

He wasn't sure if it would be a good idea or not. But it was something he

needed to do.

Looking once again at the girl, he let out a small smile to say he was

sorry, and then he was off. Soon, Becky pulled herself together and began

checking on her friends and watcher.

She would always remember that smile.

A sad lost smile. And just a little off center.

Council Hall, a few days later.

Giles sat at his desk, with a old book and a fresh cup of tea. It was his

morning break. His one vice. Every morning, he would drink some tea and

read one of his favorite books. It was a way to get away from the wear and

tear of being the Head Watcher. He had held this position for the last 8

years. It had been his pleasure and honor to rebuild the organization back

into what it was supposed to be, and away from what it had become.

All with the help of the other Scoobies.

He had just taken the first sip from his tea when Willow barged in.

"Giles, we have problem," she said without waiting for him to even look up

from his tea.

"Yes?" Giles replied, looking up from his tea with some regret.

Someone had hacked the Council's mainframe. He had accessed personal files,

mainly on Xander, but they had also accessed some of the personal files of

the core group, once known as the Scoobies.

That bothered both Willow and Giles. With Xander's disappearance, and now

someone was looking for him, as well as the other Scoobies, it definitely

looked like something was up.

And now, the Local team in LA been taken down. Thank God, no one was

killed. They could very easily have been killed. But with the Slayer healing

they should be back up and about soon, thou they will not be taking meany

chances with the next "Normal person" they come across. The team did get a

bit of luck and got a print off the lead Watcher's cell phone, though.

"Thanks to Riley," Willow said, who had kept in touch with the Scoobies

after the fall of Sunnydale, "we matched up his finger prints. It's not

good. Someone named Jason Bourne."

"And just what's so bad about him?" Giles asked. He could tell Willow was

quite disturbed by this name.

"His file is major badness, Giles. He's a killer." Willow paused to slow

down and get a breath. "He was credited with at least 45 deaths in Asia,

and an unknown amount in Europe. Remember that big African leader, that was

assassinated in Paris last year?" To which Giles nodded, "That was Bourne.

He is wanted by the CIA, Interpol - just about everyone wants him. According

to his file, he has a KOS tag."

"A Chaos tag?" The head watcher asked not having heard the term before.

"No, a kay oh ess tag," Willow explained. "Kill on Sight."

"Why would someone like that be looking into Xander?" Giles asked, his tea

forgotten.

No one knew where Xander had finally ended up. He had just left the group

after The Fight. Willow had used both tracking spells and all of their ties

with the governments of the world only to find nothing. Locator spells

would come up blank every time.

Not dead, just blank. The only thing Giles or any other spellcaster he knew

of could figure was that he was protected by someone very powerful.

Of course, Lady Haversham, leader of a the English coven, had the idea that

maybe Xander wasn't Xander anymore. Something had so significantly had

changed him that he wasn't Xander anymore.

No one really believed that, but who wanted to tell that to a Coven leader?

Especially one as powerful as Lady Haversham?

"So, can we get anything on him? He might be a lead to Xander or at least

to someone that might know his whereabouts," Giles finally asked.

"Nope," Willow replied. She was worried. Someone was after her Xan and she

couldn't protect him. "This Bourne guy has just as much blockage going on

as Xan does. Xand is in trouble and we need to save him."

Just then a dark haired boy ran into the office, followed by three very

tired looking girls around the same age.

"Gramps!" the boy called as he dodged around the chairs, keeping the girls,

who were almost growling at the boy, just behind him. "I didn't do nothing!"

"Mr. Giles," the lead girl said. "He was peeping in the girls changing

room!"

Giles looked at the boy as he dodged the girls' grasp again by jumping over

a coffee table, almost knocking off his tea pot.

"I was looking for Sherry. She was supposed be in there," the boy called as

he dove under Giles' desk, only to slide out the other side. Willow stood

there, watching the boy with a small smile and small shake of her head.

He gets the trouble finding skill honestly, she thought to herself as he

once again dodged the girls' hands. Anyone with his parentage couldn't be

blamed for trouble finding them.

"Ladies. Mr. Wood," Giles called out, bringing the boy and the girls to a

stop, the girls looking down and waiting for punishment for chasing him, THE

BOY, in here. And the boy looked up at Giles, almost daring him to punish

him.

"Mr. Wood, why were you looking in the changing room for Ms. Killain?" Giles

asked, every inch the schoolmaster. He could recall most of the new

admissions here, and Sherry Killain was a mouse of a girl, much like Willow

in her younger days.

And from what he had heard, Alex had taken up with her as soon as he had

returned from South America with his mother. Faith, his mother, would not

let the boy out of her sight for long. She would take him along on

missions, saying that it was good enough for his father, it would be good

enough for him, and she wouldn't hide what she did from him.

"Coach Kelly sent me to get her. She got hurt in a sparring match, and he

wanted to see that she was ok." The defiance was strong in him. He had the

pissed off at the world look his mother had, but it was softened by the

smile that had his father had had, and he had a "Who, me?" look on at the

same time.

"And if I call the Coach, he would back up your story?" Giles asked. Willow

smirked behind the young man as he started to squirm. Willow had been a

major part of the boy's life, as she was one of his surrogate mothers.

"Well, yes. He told me to look for her. He just didn't say where. I asked

Kennedy were she was and she told me that Sherry was in the changing room."

"So you went to find her, and not to peek?" Giles asked ,the girls behind

him giving him death glares.

"I don't peek at girls," Alex said with an offended tone. "Gramps, you do

know who my mom is, right?"

"What's that got to do with it?" one of the girls asked. All three of the

girls were new to the school and Alex was often gone with his mother.

"My mom took me to nude beaches all my life, and she sleeps nude. I have

seen more nude women and girls than are in this school. I don't peek."

Giles blushed a little at the statement from the boy. Once again, Faith's

parenting skill showed through. Faith had often lived a clothing optional

life style, and Alex was in no way bothered with nude women. In his mind,

there were nude women and naked women. Nude was ok; naked made him blush.

Naked was when it was two people alone and doing something only couples

should do together.

"Still, you don't just walk in to a changing room without asking," Giles

stated.

"I did ask. I knocked and called in. No one answered, so I went in to see

if Shelly was in there, hurt."

"Girls?" Giles asked.

"I don't know, sir. We didn't hear him," the leader of the group said,

looking at her friends.

"Very well," Giles said. "You three, return to your classes. I'll handle

this."

Once they were gone, he looked at Willow, who was still in the room.

"You, too, Willow," Giles said with a strong voice.

"He's my godson. I'll be staying," Willow said, looking down at the boy.

She and Faith, his mother, had become close friends over the years, causing

some rumors about Faith and which side of the stick she drove lately. But

nothing like that had happened.

They were just good friends, with this boy in common. Rupert Alexander

Wood.

Willow was the first one to find out about Alex. Who would just about start

a fight with anyone who called him Rupert. It was one of his deep dark

secrets. She, along with Joyce and Buffy, had taken up slack and raised the

boy his first three years while Faith was in prison, taking the boy to see

her there. Faith had wanted it that way. Alex was the one person in her

life she never lied to or would put up false fronts around.

Faith wasn't perfect after getting out, but she was there. And with the

others, it was his family. He had traveled the world with his mom. She had

became the one that they would send if they thought a Slayer had gone bad.

She'd been there and done that, and mostly could talk the girls back to the

straight and narrow. And if she couldn't, she could stop them. Thank god,

that hadn't happened too often. She even recruited a few of the Slayers

that she saved into helping her out. Her latest one was Becky.

Faith had gotten married to Wood just after the fall of Sunnydale, and Wood

had even adopted Alex. They were good for each other at the time.

But it didn't last. Wood wanted to be the perfect family; he had a wife and

a child, and wanted more kids. Faith didn't. Alex was enough for her.

Wood wanted the picked fences and wanted Faith out of Slaying, and to stay

home and be the wife at home that would wait for her man to get home with

the slippers in her hands and his pipe in the other. And have HIS kids.

Well, let's just say that wasn't Faith.

One night, Faith took Alex to Willow's and went out. She didn't do

anything, just Dancing with the girls. Tara, Kennedy and Buffy had taken

out a bunch of the baby Slayers out to blow off some steam. It was a good

night. Drinks, smokes and dancing, just like old times.

Faith realized then that it was the first time she had been happy in a long

time. She was going to tell Wood the whole thing and try get him to come

with her. Hell, they were young. It was time to live life.

Once home, she found Wood was waiting with Alex, who was around six at the

time. The fight was on as soon she walked in the door. He called her names

like bitch (which she was honest enough with herself to say was true), and

then slut (which wasn't). She had never been a slut; yeah, she had enjoyed

herself in her short life, true enough, but she as not a slut. No man would

make her be one or call her one. Next, Wood brought up how she had another

man's child, and even named him after the guy. Then Wood hit her - the one

thing that was unforgivable to her. It had been just reaction for him, a

heat of the moment thing. But she would not stay in the house anymore. She

picked up Alex and was out the door.

They were divorced within the year.

And from that day, Alex would not call Wood 'Dad' anymore. He was Wood. Or

dickhead if no one else was around.

And over the next few years, Alex had been from one side of the world to the

other, always with his mom. She watched out for him, taught him everything

he knew.

And now, once again, Alex was back with his true family, the only one he

ever really counted. He never really liked Wood, merely put up with him for

his mom. So she wouldn't be alone. He didn't matter, as long she was happy.

"So, how have you been, Alex?" Giles asked.

"Ok. Mom's been jumping around lately. We just got in last night. She's

sleeping in our rooms."

"What was that all about, anyway?" Giles once again proving that he could

read the boy.

"Nothing," Alex said, looking anywhere but at Giles, only to see Willow

tapping her foot.

What is about her? I can never lie with her around. Alex asked himself.

She gives me that look and out comes the truth. Got to be a witchy thing.

"Alex?" Giles asked softly.

"Those three were picking on Sherry. They had her cornered in the changing

room and were calling her names. They're better fighters than her, so she

won't stand up to them, because they take it out on her on the mats."

"So you just happened to be there at the right time?" Willow asked,

remembering another dark haired boy that would stand up for her.

"The three of them planned it out. I was watching them. And I followed,"

Alex said. He was feeling like a first class narc for telling what was

going on.

"Very well. I understand now what is going on. Alex, go back to classes,

I'll be talking to your mother tonight. She will decide what punishment you

get," Giles said. Alex swallowed. He loved his mom, but she was a bitch

when it came to punishment getting handed out. Sparring drills were in his

future. A lot of them.

"Make sure Sherry gets extra training, will you, Willow?" Giles told the

redheaded woman, once the young man was gone. "And see what more you can

dig up on the Bourne character. He will have to be dealt with. No one

hurts us or the girls." A little bit of Ripper slipped into his voice.

After Willow had left, Giles once again picked up his tea, while thinking

back over what he had heard young Alex say.

"You are your father's son," Giles said, taking off his glasses and pinching

the bridge of his nose.


	2. Chapter 2

Cleveland

The After-hours

The place was jumping.

At least that's what the crowd thought; Faith wasn't too sure.

She'd been on the home front for a few days now and it was her turn at a club run. The job of the night was to make sure that the girls had fun without anyone dying. And so far, it had been an OK night - just nothing to write home about.

She had left Alex in Kennedy's hands for the night, dealing out punishments. She didn't want the girls at the school to think that he could get away with going where no boy should go - not that she was really upset with him.

She knew his reasons and that he would stand by his guns 'til the last. It was just the way the boy was wired, and she knew it wasn't to get a look at the girls. She had seen the three that he was supposed to have been peeking at. They were so not her boy's type; he liked them with brains. The little redhead he had started to hang out with was his style. She'd almost caught him kissing her, or at least trying to before she had left for the club.

But with the extra training the girl is going to get and the punishment detail Alex is going on, that wouldn't be happening again for a long while. Not that she was against Alex getting any, but she wanted him to be ready and not just jump into something he was not ready for.

She knew from experience, Slayers were ready early. Her boy, she wasn't so sure. And it was a subject that was off-limits to her with him. Sure, they had talked about sex, the bare facts and then some. But the who's and the when's were a no-go. She sometimes wished that son-of-a-bitch Wood had worked out, because then at least Alex would have a man to talk to.

But then she would remember the hit. And there was no way she would let someone who'd hit a woman, their wife, teach her son anything.

After a few hours at the club, and most of the Baby Slayers were gone. Most just wanted to dance and do a little flirting, then head home. A few were looking for a man, for the night, for forever, which ever worked out. But most didn't really know what they wanted, only that the life that they had been Called to live was a lonely one. The Council looked the other way on these affairs as long as no one was getting hurt. And with the life of the girls, the terror, dirt, blood and guts, any joy they could get was a plus.

Taking a break from the dance floor, Faith glanced around the club. Across the room in a dark corner, she could just make out the last of the Baby Slayers - not that they were that young. A few had been in the biz for more than 8 years. But once Buffy had started to call them Baby Slayers, it kind of stuck.

Not that anything mattered what Buffy thought. She had taken a hike and never came back. Buffy had finally found some peace in Italy. Even though she still had a habit of falling for tall dark and stud-lies. She would call in from time to time, but mostly she stayed away. Dying two times was enough; now she just wanted to live.

Getting a fresh drink from the bar, she had drummed it into the girls never drink from a glass that has been out of your sight or the sight of your buds, what with the date rape dugs and all. Slayers would shake them off faster than a normal girl, but why take the chance?

Then she felt him.

Turning her head, she noticed that there was a cute guy standing beside her. Not looking at her but at the dance floor - like he wanted to join in but didn't know how.

"Hi," Faith said, watching the guy to see how he responded.

"Hello," the Guy said with a slight Russian accent. She had spent a year in Russia awhile back, so she could recognize it. That, and the girls watched the Hunt for Red October last night.

"Want to dance?" Faith asked while looking at his hands. Nope, no ring. Might be single, she thought to herself. The old Faith wouldn't care, but the new one did. She wasn't going to be a home wrecker if she could help it.

"No, sorry, can't dance," the guy said with a smile. "Never had the need to know how."

That smile, she had seen it before. Where exactly, she couldn't say, but it was so familiar, and she felt safe with him. She couldn't explain it. He was just had the nice guy vibes in spades. But there was a touch of darkness in his eyes, the sign of someone see too much, too soon. She had seen the look in the mirror a time or two. An outsider-looking-in look. She had had that look a lot while in SunnyD, only to loose it after she and Willow had pulled it together and made a friendship.

The guy seemed to draw himself up, like he just noticed who he was talking to.

"But if you want, you can show me how?" he suggested, a shy smile on his face, one that Faith thought was just irresistible.

"I'm sure I can show you how to move. But can you keep up?" Faith asked, watching. So far, so good. But there was just a nagging something saying that she knew this guy. Her Slayer senses were telling her that, but for the life of her, she couldn't recall from where.

"I can only try, but I'm sure that you would be worth the chase," the guy said, holding out his hand. "By the way, my name's Mikhail Kharkov."

"Name's Faith, Mikky," Faith told him, taking his hand with a caress. Smiling her sexiest smile at him, she watched him almost melt.

Pulling him out on the dance floor, she saw he could move, but he couldn't dance. The only person she had even known to dance worse was Xander Harris. A small pain went through her at the thought of the missing Scooby. Only he was a bad dancer for other reasons than Mikky here was.

While Mikky was stiff, and was too busy trying to mix in with the crowd, Xander was an explosion on the dance floor, flailing about into everyone around. But she'd still had a good time. For some reason, she'd felt protected with him there. Not something she was used to. Even Woody had never made her feel protected. She'd always felt like the protector.

She was sweaty and tired, and feeling good, as she moved up to the bar with Mikky right behind her.

"Well, did I keep up?" the Russian asked with that same semi-familiar smile.

"So far." She was hyped; the guy had stamina. Now, can he keep a conversation going? Again, not something the old Faith would have cared about, but hell, everyone grew up.

"I'm going to have to leave soon. Want to go get some coffee and cool down?" Mikky asked.

"Sure." Faith stood, wrapping her arms around his, pulling him toward the door, while giving the last of the Baby Slayers a hand sign that she was leaving and that they should be wrapping it up, and heading home as well.

Kelly watched them leave with a smile. She was glad that Faith had had a hook-up. She knew Faith had danced with the guy most of the night, but not really looked at him. But when Faith went to leave with him, it struck her how long it had been for Faith to have a steady guy around.

After Wood, Faith had jumped around a lot. But never tying herself down to anyone guy. Just a long line of one night stands, never bringing them home. Just one night stands, 'cause she didn't want to hurt her son by bringing home every Tom, Dick and Harry. So she would make sure her son was ok, then she would settle her needs. She might be a mom, but she still was a Slayer, with all the drives and needs.

Then Kelly saw who was walking beside Faith.

It was him! The last person to be seen with Andrew and Dana. Kelly had been one of the Slayers sent to pick her up from Angel.

And here he was, leaving with Faith.

Kelly took off after the couple. But by the time she had reached the door, they were gone. Cursing, she pulled out her cell phone, hitting number one on the speed dial.

"Oracle," a smooth voice answered.

"Dawn, we've got a problem," the out of breath Slayer said, trying to look up and down the street at the same time.

This is nice. Faith thought as she sat in the living room of Mikky's apartment. The night had gone by very fast. First was the coffee shop where they had cooled down with Iced Coffees, not that they needed to cool down - the temp outside was just above freezing and a light rain had started.

And after that, they had driven to his apartment. They had talked all night. She had told him about being a single mom and about Alex, about Wood. She had talked about all the Scoobies, not telling about what they do, only about who they were and what kind of friends they are. She didn't want to scare the guy away with talks about Vampires and demons.

And he told her about his life, a childhood of pain. One where his parents didn't care, one where his friends turned on him 'til he left to find his own way. He'd traveled the world, seen the sights. Then he found love: Marie. She was killed in India. A car accident. Now he was alone, looking for old friends. Maybe to try to get together with them if it all works out. He was still in the dark about what had happened in their lives since he had been gone.

After that, she had let herself out, catching a taxi on the corner and headed home. It was the first time in a long time that she had spent the night with a guy, and even longer that she had stayed the night and only talked.

And she had liked it.

She had felt safe and told him things she had never told anyone else. How she ended up in jail, and how she had pulled herself up from that. And the best thing was, he had listened. Really listened. She'd poured her soul out to him and he didn't flinch or run. The only person she had ever talked to like that had been Wood and lately, Willow, too.

And that had been before the break up.

As the taxi pulled up in front of the main house on the compound, she noticed something was up and it didn't look good. Weapons were out and the Baby Slayers were all over the place, preparing for something.

As she came in, all movement stopped.

What the hell? Faith thought watching everyone standing watching her.

Giles office

"Giles, I can't find her," Willow whispered. She seemed to sink into herself.

"You did your best," Giles said in a fatherly voice to the young woman. "We will find her. People are already combing the streets. She couldn't have gotten far."

"But she one of my best friends," Willow almost was sobbing. "What do I tell Alex?"

"Nothing as of yet," Giles told the distressed woman. "Faith often stays out all night. He is protected and we are his family. Faith will be home soon."

I hope, Giles silently added.

He knew that if something bad had happened, it already had. But if it had, then it would be vengeance for whatever happened to his lost child. That was a promise he made to himself, every time he lost one of the girls or a Watcher.

Most times it was an empty promise, because you might never find who had harmed them.

"It's like something is blocking me," Willow said. "It can't be a person or a higher power. It doesn't have the organic feel of someone was blocking, it has to be a talisman."

"Are you sure?" Giles knew very well she was, but it was something to get her mind off of her friend.

"Yes, remember the witch doctor? The one that selling slayers on the black market? He used talismans. That's what this feels like."

"Are you sure of that?" Giles asked again. He hoped that nothing like that had happened to the dark-haired Slayer.

"The feelings are right, but the darkness is not there. It's more chaos than anything else. I know she alive and safe but not were. I don't know if the feelings are right or just wishful thinking."

"Willow," Giles paused, "what we do is dangerous. IF something has happened, then we will handle it, but Faith is too good to fall for this. She will get away."

Just then the door opened, and in walked Faith.

"Yo G!" the Dark Slayer called out. "What's this about me being kidnapped?"

"FAITH!" Willow almost screeched as she launched herself at the dark haired friend.

"I'm ok," Faith letting the red head hold onto her, recalling the last time Willow was this out of it.

It was on the Bluff.

Flashback

Kingman's Bluff

Willow stood before the ruins pumping energy into the statue of Proserpina.

"This is a bad idea, Red," Faith said.

She stood behind the redhead, holding the hand of her son. Faith had been back for a year now. The fact that she was a mother and had worked hard on improving herself in prison, without causing any problems there, was a major plus on the early release.

She had returned to Sunnydale and tried to fit back in, but with Buffy, it had been a trial. But they had eventually worked past it. Even made a halfway friendship with the Scoobies. But it had mainly been because of Alex that the Scoobies had even tried to be friends.

And it was because of Alex that Faith was even at the Bluff. She couldn't find any of the others to watch Alex while she tried to stop her friend. So there they were: Slayer and child facing a lost witch.

"You shouldn't be here," Willow said looking around at the dark-haired girl, a cruel smile on her face.

"I have to try," Faith said with a shrug of her shoulders. "I kind of like the world spinning, ya know?"

"All this sadness all this hate and the pain?" Willow replied. "I can see into your soul, Faith. I see what Daddy did to you and what Mommy let happen. I see what you had to do for food, even with that fat guy that held you down so he could ram himself down your throat, and you let him do it just so you could have dry bed for the night. And you still want to save the world like it is?"

"Yes," Faith said the shadows of what had happened in her eyes as she glanced down at her son. "I would keep the world the way it is right now, because it makes the bright spots so much brighter."

Alex didn't really understand what was happening. He knew that Aunt Willow was sad and that Aunt Tara was gone. He had been with Dawn when she had walked in on the body. He might be young but he had gotten an understanding of dead things very early. He had been there when his Aunt Buffy had found his Grandma Joyce. And now his Aunt Tara was gone and with her all the secrets that he had with his quiet aunt was gone.

Like finding her and Willow's magic wand - it had been in a drawer that had been left open, and it was really neat. It was long and kind of thick with a blunted point to it. He had thought it was like that so it would stick in anyone if they fell on it. And at the base was a twisted knob. And when you turned it, it buzzed and vibrated. It was a blast. He had played with it all afternoon, 'til Aunt Tara had walked it to check on him. She had blushed, then taken it away, saying it was supposed to be used that way. But she never told him how it was to be used.

Now she was gone, and his redheaded aunt was hurting. Like he was hurting, from the loss of his nice aunt so soon after his Grandma Joyce had gone away. Uncle Spike had sat him down and explained about death, and how their souls where watching them. And that they wouldn't want them to be sad because they had to go away.

"I can't let you do this, Red. Not now, not when I am finally happy."

With that, the Dark Slayer moved. She dropped her son's hand, then charged, only to be knocked back by a wave of magic, sending the brunet flying back toward the tree line.

Willow smiled, then turned back to the temple.

Just as she drew in the power and was going to release it. A small hand tugged on her shirt and she looked down into two dark eyes.

"Sorry, Aunt Willow," Alex said.

He was proud of his vocabulary, being a student of both Willow and Tara. He had learned a lot of big words.

But they all had failed him so he told his aunt how he felt.

"W…W…what?" Willow said, faltering, the magic leaking out of her. She was still the Dark Witch but the energy of the earth was sipping away.

"Sorry, Aunt Tar is gone. I sorry." The dark eyes were full of tears. One of his mothers was gone and the other was hurting. And there was nothing he could do about it. He wanted to help but he couldn't.

Those eyes…she could remember those eyes on another boy. One that was her brother in all ways. One that she drove off. All she knew was that he was somewhere out there. Hurting, happy, dead she didn't know.

And now she was the guardian of his son.

A son that loved her no matter what. One that had loved her Tara and lost her as well. One that seen her throw his mother across the field. And he still loved her. One that had lost and still had love.

Faith had drew herself up and saw the witch with her son.

"Willow, you hurt him, and I will kill you," Faith said, moving up closer to the duo.

"Faith, how can he love me?" Willow said the pain in her voice was almost physical as she dropped to her knees in front of the boy.

"He's like his father," Faith said with a small smile.

"I'm bad," Willow whispered. "I hurt people. I hurt Tara. I hurt you. I hurt Xander. I've ran everyone away from me."

"No, you didn't Red," Faith said getting closer to the witch. "I'm still here, Alex is here. We'll find Xan one day."

"But Tara gone," whispered the redhead.

"She watching us, don't be sad," Alex said looking at his Aunt. "Uncle Spike told me that the souls watch over us once they get to heaven."

"Yes," Willow said. "But she'd be disappointed in me."

"No, you loved her and she loved you. That all that matters," Faith said. "You lost it for a little while. I did the same thing. But I came back, and so can you. It just takes guts to make the first step. But if you're willing, we'll walk it with you 'til you can walk it alone."

At which point, the witch started to cry, and Alex jumped into her arms and held on as he, too, cried. Faith watched for a few seconds then she knelt down and pulled the two people into a hug, holding them as they cried out with the loss of a loved one.

End Flash Back

"I'm ok, Red," Faith whispered to her friend. "So what's the deal? I go out meet a guy and I'm kidnapped? I know it's been a long time since I got my groove on, but..."

"Faith, are you alright?" Giles asked slowly. He wanted an answer before he would tell her what had happened.

"Sure, G," Faith said. This was freaking her out. "Just drank some Coffee. Talked to a guy, no big deal, just a good night more or less. More less than more right now."

"The man you left with... Do you know where he may be found?" Giles asked.

"Yeah," Faith looked down at the redhead, then up to the head Watcher. "Why?"

"He might be the man that left with Andrew, the night he disappeared with Dana," Giles said calmly. Dana was one of the girls in his files that had disappeared over the years. His failures, the ones that he couldn't protect.

"Shit... HE'S a black hat?" Faith gasped. "No way! He was way too nice."

"His description matches that of Jason Bourne. The man who is looking for Xander," Giles told the Slayer watching as the news sink in.

Alex! If he knew about Alex, he could use that as a weapon to hurt Xan!

"I didn't say anything about Alex being Xan's kid," Faith said as she searched her memory to make sure she didn't say anything to Bourne about Alex's dad.

"Are you feeling up to a little run?" Giles asked.

"Yes," Faith said. She knew what was coming: she was needed to protect the girls again.

"Take a team and bring Bourne to me," Giles said. "I want him alive but if he gets hurt, then he gets hurt. Don't let the girls get hurt if you can help it. But I want him here. I have some questions to ask."

You and me both, Faith added silently, while out loud she said, "I just need someone to cover my shift today."

"Willow can do it," Giles replied.

"What have you got to do today?" the redhead asked as she pulled herself together.

"Mall run," Faith told her friend.

"Oooooohhhh! Victoria's Secret!" the redhead said, her mind already going over what she would pick up. "Kennedy won't know what hit her." A grin started spreading across her face.

"Willow, I am sure I don't need to know about your choices in your lingerie, or who would like to see it!" Giles said sternly.

"G?" Faith asked looking at the head watcher. "You're a guy, aren't you?"

"Yes, Faith. I am," Giles replied, wondering where this was going.

"Well, all guys want to know what lesbians wear and who they wear it for, and if they can watch," she said, a grin spreading across her face as she left to get her team together and check on her son.

Willow just grinned, then she got up to leave only to stop and look at the thunderstruck Giles.

"She's right, you know." Then she, too, left. "You guys are all perverts."


	3. Chapter 3

Part 4

Sometime that morning, the cold rain from the night before turned from ice cold bits of wetness, to real ice. The ground had been covered in a thin sheen of ice, along with most cars in the neighborhood.

Bourne felt something off as he walked back to his apartment. He had gone for his usual morning run and the park, but cut it short once he noticed the ice on the ground. Because of his time in Europe, the ice and cold hadn't really bothered him that much. Well, that wasn't actually true; it bothered him, but it was still just another thing to either get used to or ignore. All part of the missions.

His mind had been on the night before. Going over and over what he had said, and what Faith had said. It had been a mistake. He'd gone to the club to get a feel of the city. Nothing else.

But when he'd ended up beside Faith at the bar, he had to go with the flow. And he had gone a lot farther than his training had prepared him for. He had dropped his guard with Faith - something he was not prepared for. Usually, he would take days to study his subjects 'til he knew them backwards and forwards, then make contact. But this time his going with the flow had just been so nice.

He'd had fun, more than he had in quite a while. It was almost like a date, but not really like one. He'd listened to Faith talk about herself, about her son and her failed marriage. And it was nice. He found himself just enjoying the time, not looking for weaknesses.

But he had to keep in his mind at all times, was this was the enemy? Maybe. How had he ended up in Treadstone? Had these people sold him out? Had he been taken? Compromised - that still stuck in his mind. They were to kill him if he had been compromised. Would getting his memories back compromise him? Or did they mean something else? The work he had done was full of double meaning for everything from talking to killing someone.

But still, with all that on his mind, he'd still had fun. And then the memory of that beautiful creature that was Faith sitting on him, slowly squeezing the life out of him while she just smiled, had popped into his head.

It was all very confusing. Could he have been an agent for them? No, he would have been too young. Hell, she would have been too young. It didn't make any since. Well, now that he was here, he would find out, now that he had an in.

As he approached his building, he noted that something was off. Just as he crossed the parking lot of his building and opened the door to the back, it clicked.

The SUV.

It was parked on the street, but there was no ice on it. And someone was sitting in it. They had scrunched down as he walked toward the building.

The SUV didn't fit the neighborhood. The neighborhood had some high end cars but not that many SUVs. The people just didn't make enough to keep the gas tank filled, much less cover the insurance that it would take.

He was blown. He had done or said something last night and the COWs had found him out. As he was turning to leave, a voice brought him up short.

"Hello, Mikky," Faith said as she moved into the light, to stand just outside the door. She had been just inside the doorway, just out of sight. As she spoke, three other Slayers moved up behind him. And the SUV pulled into the parking lot.

"Why, Faith," Bourne said, pulling the Russian accent out once again and putting on an innocent face. "You forget something?"

Faith looked him over, all her senses screaming both that his guy was dangerous and, the same time, that he should be trusted.

Last night there was no sense of danger. She'd felt protected with him, then, but now danger was just under the surface. Now she felt like she was talking to a master vampire.

"Bourne, drop the act. We know who you are. And you're coming with us."

"Sorry, Faith, can't do that," Bourne replied to the Dark Slayer.

"Then we do this the hard way," Faith said cracking her knuckles. "Just one question before I beat you down. Why play me?"

"Faith, everything I said last night I meant. I did not knowingly lie to you about anything," Bourne said, his mind already working overtime on escape plans.

Most revolved around killing these girls - something he didn't want to do. He had a nine millimeter pistol in a holster under his sweats but that was a weapon of last resort. These girls were just kids. Sure, they were in the Business, but still, they were kids. And he knew about their training. And that the fight with ones in LA he had been lucky; if he had to do that again, he would lose. Those girls didn't know how to deal with him. These girls were treating him as if he was dangerous.

And like he told Faith, he wouldn't go in. He'd had enough of people controlling him, locking him up, hurting him. And if they believed that he was this Xander and that he had been compromised – After reading the files on Harris and on the rest of this group, he knew their reaction. They killed anyone compromised.

"Right," Faith said. She wanted to believe him. She really did. And it shocked her how much she wanted to believe it. But this was the guy that was hunting Xander, and if he had found out about Alex –

"This is going to hurt you. You gotta choice: walking or not." Trying to give him one more chance.

"Won't go in, Faith." All pretence of an accent gone. He even seemed to grow a inch while she was watching.

The other girls behind him also drew up, expecting something.

Then, as one, the Slayers moved. Faith reached for Bourne's front while the others grabbed his back. But as Faith reached out, Bourne also moved.

Grabbing Faith's arms in a wristlock, he pulled her. The ice that had formed on the top step where she was standing added to her momentum, and the next thing she knew, she was slamming into the girls behind Bourne.

As soon as Faith left Bourne's arms, he was moving into the building, slamming the door behind him. Cursing furiously, the girls pulled themselves apart and off the frozen ground, just in time to see the door closing. And then with a loud click, it locked.

The girls moved, wet slush sliding into their clothes as they moved, and this only drove their tempers that much more into kill mode.

Inside the apartment building, Bourne tore off down the hallway. As he reached the end of the hallway, he could hear the door being smashed open. And then it slammed on the floor from a very powerful hit.

Then he was out front. Hitting the sidewalk, he slowed a little to take a fast look around. The street was almost empty, a icy slush was on the ground.

If I can make it to the end of the street, I'm home free, he thought as he started down the steps in front of the building. He had parked a backup car there. But as soon as he was outside, he heard a powerful motor. The SUV was on the move, and it came out of the parking lot only 20 feet from where he stood.

No time to get his getaway car; he had to move on foot. Bourne cut across the street and down a small alleyway, that was too small for the SUV, but from the sounds behind him, not for the girls. He could make out at least three sets of footfalls behind him and they were gaining.

He knew if he kept it up, they would be on him soon. But on the next street he caught a break. At a red light, A man on a motorcycle was waiting at the traffic light.

Not pausing for a second, Bourne hit the guy with a forearm blow across the side of the neck, knocking him from the cycle. Then, before it could fall as well, he was on it and cutting through the red light.

Faith and the Slayers just cleared the alley way to the sounds of car horns and that of a motorcycle speeding off. She could make out Bourne's figure on a high performance bike as he cut off through the morning traffic.

"Mother fucking shit!" Faith screamed at the retreating form. "I'll get you! You COCKSUCKER!" To say she was pissed about him getting away was an understatement.

Just then the Council's SUV pulled in front of her.

A evil grin formed on her face. The cocksucker hadn't got away yet, not yet.

With a whoop, she took off, pushing Marc who was driving, over from behind the wheel. Gunning the motor, she floored it. The Slayers with her almost didn't get in before the SUV cut through the traffic after the motorcycle.

Bourne had eased off the gas on the bike. He was cold, he only had on his sweats that he had on from his run this morning. The cold wet air whipped through his hair, and he was without a helmet or eye protection. It was difficult to keep up with any speed without either. Glancing into the mirror on the sports bike, he saw the SUV gaining on him, Faith behind the wheel with a feral grin on her face.

After seeing that grin, Bourne pulled himself tight against the bike and poured on the gas. The bike seemed to jump as it accelerated down the street. Faith just smiled more and floored the SUV. The Hunt - it was her favorite part. The kill at the end was fun too, but the hunt was needed. It let her become someone else and lose herself. And this fucker was just what she needed.

Giles left his office to do his morning walk around the school, to meet the new students and talk to the teachers. All of the teachers at the school knew about the underworld and the darkness that the girls here fought. Giles had recruited them from schools that had been close to supernatural events, and from the families of the girls. The male students were brothers to the Slayers or from the surviving Watchers families. And so far, only Alex was a son of an Active Slayer. There were a few boys here that were the sons of a Slayer, but those were born before their mother was called. Before that day.

Walking thought the teachers lounge, he saw that there was another car chase on the telly. This was the third one this week. Most had been over before it made the news but this one seemed to be going on for a while. At his entrance, the teachers looked at him and slowly made their way out of the room. As the last one left, Giles noticed that the chase involved an SUV much like the one used for stakeouts by the Slayers. And it was chasing a man on a motorcycle, while three city police cars chased it, and two highway patrol cars were behind them, followed up by a state trooper car.

It was then a close up shot of the SUV came on the screen. Faith - she was driving the SUV.

The world just stopped for Giles for a moment and he just stared at the screen of the TV. He didn't move a muscle.

Outside the lounge, the teachers had moved across the hall.

"It's quiet in there," Marge said as she watched the room.

"Yeah. But do you want to go in there right now?" John said. Both had been at the school since it opened, and knew Giles was not a violent man.

But this was big. And no way did he want to be a ground zero.

Just then a very calm Giles left the room. He looked at the teachers. Then with a small smile, he turned an walked toward his offices.

As he left the group, he could be heard muttering to himself.

"She's trying to kill me. First Xander, then her, then her son. The whole family is blooming nuts."

Faith was zoned. The bastard was not going to get away. Beside her, Marc was giving a constant call of "Faith! Car! CAR!" She would always miss them but it was funny to the girls in back who were laughing and hooting with the enjoyment of the chase.

"Marc, don't be such a pussy," Faith said, not really looking at the young watcher. "You'll ruin you manly standing with the girls."

Just then the dashboard beeped at her. Looking over, she saw the hands-free cell phone interface was flashing.

"Yeah?" Faith asked.

"What are you doing?" came Giles' smooth voice over the speakers.

"Uh. Nothing much, just watching Bourne," Faith said, not really lying as she looked out the front windshield at the bike.

"You sure you don't want to tell me something?"

"No, G. What would I need to tell you about?" Faith asked, just as Marc once again started to point and yell about a car in their way.

"Oh, I don't know Faith," Giles said. "How about the police cars behind you? Or what about the news helicopter that's along flying taking pictures as we speak?"

"No shit," Faith said, "We're on TV?"

"Yes, Faith. On TV. What part of secret organization don't you understand?" Giles' voice was getting deeper and loosening its upper-class tone.

Just then, Marc let loose with an almost girlish scream about trucks. Up ahead, Bourne cut between two semi-trucks. The lanes had concrete retaining walls on either side and there was nowhere for the SUV to get through.

"Got to go, G. Catch you later," Faith said, hanging up the phone with a push of a button. Then, grabbing the wheel, she turned into the retaining wall.

Hitting the wall at an angle, it threw the vehicle up on its two left wheels. With that, Faith floored it and shot past the trucks. Once on the other side, she twisted the wheel, dropping back to four wheels.

Back at the school, Giles just sat back, watching the school's SUV hit the wall, then shoot forward on two wheels.

"Just like Dukes of Hazzard," one of the slayers sitting beside him watching the tv said to the room, where the rest of the girls were watching it.

Giles just looked at the young girl, then thought to himself, Well at least the Insurance is paid up on it, and then recalling Marc's almost screams, and I am not it with Faith.

Bourne took a fast glance behind him. This was not good. The cops and the COWs were close. He knew that he was dead if they brought him down. If not by the COWs, then the CIA or any other agency after his head. He needed to find a crowd. If he could just lose himself for a second, he could be long gone. But with the helicopter overhead, it needed to be enclosed. Then he saw it.

Glover Leaf Mall.

If he could just make that, he would be home free. Cutting between two rigs, he poured on the gas. Using the trucks to block the road, that should give him the time he needed to make the mall. The trucks did work on the cops, who had to fall back 'til the rigs pulled apart enough for them to pass, but not the COWs. They pulled a stunt right out of an action movie and shot around the trucks.

Bourne slowed down his motorcycle, the turnoff was coming up and he didn't want to miss his chance. But slowing down allowed the Cows to catch up to him. As the COWs pulled along side of him, Xander looked over into the very pissed off face of Faith. He had seen the look in her eyes before. It was the look of a hunter who was just about to get their prey. Only not this time.

Bourne smiled at Faith, then blew her a kiss. Where that came from he didn't know. Usually he was stoic but for some reason, Faith made him feel again - much like Marie did, only more so. She was a fighter and would fight 'til the last. And for some reason, he felt safe when she was around, not something he was used to. But it wasn't enough to make him give up. He might go in with her but it would be on his terms.

And after he gave her a week to cool off.

Faith's eyes went wide with shock as Bourne blew a kiss at her. Bad guys didn't do that; well, at least they didn't affect her when they did. Not like this did. They blew past an off ramp. Behind them, the cops had worked around the trucks and were closing in on them.

Bourne looked at her again, then he did it again. He slammed on his brakes, spinning the bike, almost laying it down on the icy road. Then he shot off back down the highway. He shot between the cops, causing them to slam on their brakes. But the trucks behind them were not so lucky. Hitting their brakes, the massive trucks slid into the backs of the last patrol car, knocking it into the next one, which caused a domino effect. Soon, all the patrol cars were out of commission.

Faith spun the SUV around, and headed back through the wrecked patrol cars, knocking them out of the way to make way after Bourne. The air filled with the scream of metal on metal, and the sound of laughter from the back seat as the impact had set Marc off again, this time with praying involved.

Faith smirked at the Watcher, then turned her attention to Bourne once again, just making out the bike as he was on cutting into the mall parking lot.

Got him, she thought.


	4. Chapter 4

Bourne slid the bike to a stop in the parking lot tower beside the main entrance to the mall. Looking around to see if anyone was watching, he then pushed the bike deep into the shadows behind a van in the last row. No one would be able to see it 'til they were right on top of it. Then he raked his hand through his wind blown hair to make it look a bit more controlled and walked into the mall. While he didn't run, he didn't walk, either. He moved as a slow-seeming pace that looked like he was moving slower that he was.

He cut into the first clothing shop he came to. Walking through the store, he grab up clothing as he went and after getting a complete set, he then pulled out his traveling stash. He always kept a few hundred on his person at all times. After paying, he headed to the changing rooms. The sales clerk had removed all the tags for him when he had taken off the dye pack that were attached to them. Within 10 minutes, a man in wet sweats had disappeared, and a man that looked like he worked construction had appeared.

As Bourne walked out of the store, he noticed a lady pushing a stroller with a newborn in it. Walking up, he started a conversation with the woman and offered to help her with her bags, something she gratefully accepted. Her husband was at Circuit City at the other end of the mall and she had her hands full with the baby bag and her shopping bags.

As they walked down the concourse, Bourne noted that there were a lot of young girls moving about. Just then, he passed a redhead, A feeling of home was all around her. As he glanced up, a name popped into his head. Willow.

Outside

Faith had slammed on the brakes as she pulled up to the mall. Looking around, she saw that the bike was gone and so was Bourne.

"Where the hell..." Faith asked herself looking around, while Marc almost jumped out of the SUV. Sweat had pooled under his arms and his eyes were wide.

"I am NEVER getting in a car with you!" Marc voice was hoarse. "I'll... I'll... I'll walk back if I have to."

"Whatever floats your boat," Faith said distractedly. "Where the hell did he go?"

"Faith. Over there," one of the girls said, pointing over toward a van. "Bike tracks."

Sure enough, along the smooth concrete floor were wet bike treads along with a skid mark were it had slid to a stop. Following the tread marks to a shadowed area behind a van, she could just make out the form of the bike.

"He's inside," the other slayer said, pointing out how close they were to main entrance.

"Let's go, girls," Faith said as she moved out, tossing the keys to Marc as she walked. "Marc. Take care of the ride."

Upon entering the mall, the girls split up, each hunting for Bourne in the crowded mall.

While this was going on, Willow and Kennedy were walking around, watching the girls from the school as they shopped. Most of the older ones had left on their own with the promise to meet back at the van in two hours.

Kennedy was in a funk. Her girl was not happy and that put her mood off.

Ever since that assassin guy had came up on the radar. And with this Xander Harris business, something that could closed down all conversation without him even being there. At least with the Scoobies, that is.

Oh, Kennedy knew about him from stories, but not from Willow. She wouldn't talk about him to anyone but Faith. Although she had once overheard Willow talking to Alex about his dad. And that was something that really got under her skin. The guy just took off and they treated him like a saint. What's up with that?

Looking across the mall concourse, she could see the baby slayers running around, mixing it up with local kids or clomped together. Willow was also watching them, just from the other side of the mall.

Willow had walked off on her own after Kennedy started to ask questions about Faith's missions. While Willow couldn't keep a secret about herself, she was mum about anyone else's.

Just then, a couple walked past Willow and she stopped and looked at them. Kennedy, watching her lover, came to a stop as well looking at the couple at the attracted Willow's attention.

He was just a guy, a laborer from what he was wearing with a young woman, more than likely his wife, and their child.

Kennedy looked back to Willow to find her looking around. Then she looked back to the couple. For Kennedy, the world just stopped.

Willow wasn't looking at the couple. She was checking the guy out.

Kennedy had known that Willow did like to look at guys from time to time. She personally didn't see the reason; once she noticed girls, that was all she wrote. To look at a guy that way was nothing she wanted to do.

And Willow didn't stare at guys. She looked then that would be it. A little notice, then back to her lover. But now Ken could almost see drool forming.

That was it!

Kennedy almost stomped across to the redheaded witch.

"See something you like?" Kennedy asked in a sweet voice that in no way, shape or form matched her face.

"I know him," Willow said.

The guy gave her a good feeling. Like home.

And for some reason he reminded her of Xander.

Although he didn't look like him, aside from the same build. Then he was gone.

"You do huh?" Kennedy asked. "That why your staring at his ass?"

"What? No!" Willow protested, defending herself. "I don't look at guys' asses, only women's. Uh, that didn't come out right. Honey, I only look at yours. Oh, isn't that Faith?"

Kennedy frowned but looked over where the witch had been looking and sure enough, there was the Dark Slayer. Faith was looking at every store front and any closed door as she walked. Behind her, her team was doing the same as they each went in different directions.

Faith running a mission here? Kennedy thought. Then, Without me?

She was used to being in on every mission Faith ran when they were stationed together.

Well, that wasn't completely true. But any mission that important enough to be at the mall, she should have been called in for, after all she was part of the group that stopped the First. So why was Faith here?

A glance back to Willow and she could see the red head looking around the mall. And it hit her - Willow knew! She knew what mission Faith had been on. After the scare last night with Faith, now with Faith tearing around the mall with a pissed off look.

"That was him," she heard Willow whisper. Then Willow called out to the Dark Slayer, "This way!"

Down the mall, away from them, Bourne split up with the woman.

Thank god the mall was as big as it was. Three stories - two for the stores and one for the admin offices.

Just then, though, he heard someone yell, "This way!" and he knew he had been made. He moved off faster but still projecting a slow walk.

A few more store fronts down, he went in. It was a bookstore. One of the many nameless book stores that all looked alike. Heading toward the back, he moved among the shelves while watching the front of the store.

He could make out the forms of Faith and the redhead move past followed by a group of girls. Not long after they passed, a group of cops moved into sight.

He waited until the cops had passed, then he moved out the other way. He was almost out of the building when one the girls that had been with Faith saw him. Dialing her cell phone, she took off after him. Bourne noticed the movement from the corner of his eye and took off, hitting the service doors and heading into the maintenance section of the mall. There was a maze of passageways going to each store carrying power and water and they were big enough to have their deliveries come in.

He was almost out of the building when he was confronted by a guard.

"Hey, this is off limits. You need to go back," the man said, not really noticing that Bourne had not stopped. At least, not until he was smashed into the wall and his tazer was removed. Bourne looked at it, seeing that it was a non-lethal weapon that most security agencies had started to use. Then off to the side he heard a ding, and one of a set of elevators opened. No one got out but it gave him an idea, and behind him, he could heard footsteps.

Faith once again was in the lead. She had the bastard. That's what mattered. She heard a ding in the dark ahead of her. Elevator?

Turning a corner, she saw a guard lying on the floor. And there were the elevators. One was going up and the other had a out of order sign on it.

"Upstairs now," Faith called out, but didn't look at the others as they disappeared into the dark heading upstairs to catch the lift.

Faith just stood and watched. After a few seconds, the out-of-order elevator's doors slid open and out stepped Bourne.

She knew it. It was too easy. This guy as slippery as an Ma'noc'k demon, all slimy but without the bones.

"Mikky, Mikky, Mikky," Faith called out as she moved out of the shadows. "You know you shouldn't try to fool Mama like that. I'm going to have to spank

you."

"Faith, any other time, I might take you up on that," Bourne grinned, looking around. "But I really need to be going. How about we set a date to get together after we get this all this worked out?"

"I so-o-o don't think so," Faith said, starting to move only to pull up short when Bourne pulled out what looked like a gun. "So you're going to shoot me?"

"Only if I have too, Faith," Bourne his eyes going flat. "I like you. I really do. But I will not be locked up again."

"Well then, we've got a problem, don't we?" Faith said. "Because in about five minutes, my crew will be back and you will be going down, hard. Whether you want to or not."

"Faith, just let me go. I haven't hurt you or anyone else," Bourne told the pissed off woman before him.

"Oh yeah," Faith said, her eyes narrowing. "You're looking for my man. Can't let someone as dangerous as you near him."

Bourne stopped and looked at Faith, seeing things flashing across his mind. Faith looking down at him, her fingers digging into his throat. Her standing beside someone, looking at him, a grin on her face that could only be called evil.

"So, you strangle all your men or only the special ones?" Bourne asked, watching her reactions.

Shocked was one word for what Faith was. Only the Scoobies and Fang knew about that. Somehow, he knew something had happened; but not the what's and the how's.

"How...How did you know about that?" Faith asked feeling a little lost.

"I like you Faith, more than I've liked anyone in a long, long time," Bourne replied. "But I can't trust you; not right now."

What Bourne said was true - he did like her but how his feeling had evolved that fast for her he didn't know, and wasn't sure he liked. But after what had been done to him, he could push those feeling aside to get on with what needed to be done.

Faith stood there watching the assassin.

She could either keep him here 'til the others get back or she could let him go. But the last one was really out of consideration. Giles wanted him.

And it came down to that. Her dad wanted him. That was all it took.

While she would never admit it to Giles's face, he was the father she'd never had. And that was all it took. Because of her feelings, she might have let him go, if not for the possible danger to her son. Giles wanting him just topped it off.

Her decision was made.

Bourne could see it in her eyes when she made up her mind.

Just as Faith started to move, Bourne pulled the trigger. There was a loud bang, and Faith felt two pin pricks hit her, one high on he right breast, the other low in the stomach.

He shot me? was all she had time to think before 20,000 volts hit her, driving her to her knees. She started to move again, only to have Bourne land on her and dry stun her again with the tazer. Before she knew what was happening, Bourne had handcuffed her to a steam pipe.

Bending down, Bourne looked her over to make sure she wasn't hurt. Then he softly kissed her forehead.

"Sorry, but I wont be under anyone else's control ever again," he whispered to her.

Then he was gone.

Two days later

A very pissed-off Faith sat across from Giles in his office. She had just gotten out of the county jail.

Giles was looking out the plate glass window behind him, deep in thought. They had lost Bourne. And he had had to get Faith and Marc out of jail. It had taken some fast talking and some very deep pockets to do it.

The fines alone were high enough and then getting the SUV out of impound had been unbelievable.

And they still had nothing to show for it.

Willow had a team going over Bourne's rooms, and they had found nothing but a journal that didn't make any sense. It was full of names and places, half-completed descriptions of meeting.

And the scary parts were about Xander. His life, from childhood until he had disappeared. Not just facts that everyone was aware of, but it also had things that were private between Xander and Willow, or Faith, Buffy or even Giles.

How had Bourne gotten the information? He was looking for Xander, so it couldn't have been him, and not one of the Scoobies would sell out Xander.

Willow was also in the office. She had just gone through the last of the journal, and found nothing. But when she cast a spell on it, trying to track Bourne, she hit that same wall again, but she had feeling that tied her to the book. She knew objects that had a strong emotional meaning to a people sometimes would leave traces of the person.

She opened herself to the emotions.

First she emptied her mind. Looking around at the blank mindscape, she could feel someone, someone almost familiar. Then it was gone, leaving just pain and loneliness.

Loss of self.

To be replaced with otherness. Like someone was pored out and a new person was put in their place then another and another till it was over filled with many people.

It was chaos: emotions and personality, each fighting to be heard, but there was also a balance; none were stronger than the next. The only thing she was sure about was that Xander had held onto the journal. And not just for a brief touch, but for a length on time – months, maybe as long as a year.

And that opened all kinds on new questions.

"So, Willow," Giles asked turning to look at the witch, "What else can you tell me about the apartment?"

"Well," Willow hesitated, "He was clean."

"I don't care about hygiene, Willow." Giles replied with a sigh. "I want to know what you found out about this Bourne?"

"That's what I mean," Willow tell back with a little force. "Faith spent the better part of the night there, and we can't even find a trace of her there. much less Bourne. He cleaned the place from top to bottom - no fingerprints, no nothing. He even wiped down the underside of the toilet seat. How anal is that? He sterilized his toothbrush, no medications other than pain pills for migraines and those were for a Samantha Carter."

"Do we have a lead no her?" Giles jumped at the chance of finding more, but with shut down fast as Faith started to laughed.

"Samantha Carter is a character off a TV program called Star Gate, G. Alex likes to watch them, so I watch them with him. When I get the time," she explained fast as Willow had raised an eyebrow at the thought of the bad girl Faith watching Sci-fic.

Just then, the phone rang. Giles stood looking between the two women, one smirking at the other.

"Hello.", Giles replied over the phone.

"Hello, Mr. Giles," a voice said back after a short pause.

"Who is this?" Giles knew this was a private line; it by-passed the receptionist desk, and only a very few people even knew about the phone, much less knew the number to it.

"Call me Jason," Bourne told the head watcher. Bourne was at that very moment watching Giles through a telescopic sight. He had spent the last few hours building a sniper nest: one where he could see into the office.

He had set up a laser mike to listen in on the office. Even though he had learned to read lips, there was always a chance of mistake that way, so lip reading was always a last resort.

He could see Giles straighten up when he told him his name. It had taken a little work on a computer to find out Giles' private line number but it was worth it.

As Giles straightened up, the other two noticed. Faith had seemed to hear what was being said, which might be true, what with her being a Slayer. Those girls were heightened on something.

But the redhead, Willow, noticed the other two, so she too was drawn into the conversation.

"What do you want, Mr. Bourne?" Giles asked the girls gasping behind him.

"Besides being left alone? Nothing, really. Just everything you can tell me about Alexander Harris," Bourne told the head watcher. "I also want my journal back."

"Journal?" Giles asked, looking down at the book on his desk, "I am afraid I don't have that item."

Giles knew that if Bourne wanted it back, it had to be important, and if it was important, then he needed to find out why. Until then, it would stay in his control.

"Huh?" Bourne replied, watching the man look at his book. "You don't have it? So what can you tell me about Harris?" As he was talking he could see Willow pull out her phone, and start talking to someone - the laser mic picking up her commands to start a tracking program on Giles' phone.

"Not a lot, actually," Giles said, not really wanting to give anything to this man about Xander, but not wanting him off the phone before the tracking program kicked in. "He was once part of our group, but left for personal problems."

"So where is he now?" Bourne asked, watching Willow's face as she was getting call backs about the trace.

"No idea. He didn't leave forwarding address as you can imagine."

"I'm sure." Just then, Willow's face drew up into a frown as they completed the trace.

"Well, Mr. Giles, I want to you to sent my book to me. Have Faith bring it to the federal courthouse in three hours, or I will take action to get it back."

"Bourne, I told you, I don't have your Journal." Giles paused, looking at Willow, who was talking heatedly with someone on the phone. "And Faith is still in a cell, after the stunt you pulled yesterday."

"Your sure about that?" Bourne said, as he thought, Why is it, people in power always think they can lie and no one will catch them at it?

"Well then, look at your desk. There is my journal and to your right is Faith. I want them both at the Courthouse in an hour or actions will happen. Open your left handed drawer and look in the back of it.

"And next time, don't lie."

With that, Bourne cut the connection with a stunned Giles.

"He was in the building. They found a router in the basement. A guy was here to check the phones yesterday. He must have put it in then," Willow said, looking at Giles.

"Willow, he could see us here now," Giles said. How, he didn't know; this place was warded so no one would be able to scry his office. But somehow, Bourne had just done it.

He turned and opened the drawer the Bourne had told him about, and in the very back of the drawer was a folded piece of paper.

He opened it to see the words BOOM! written out.


	5. Chapter 5

Part 6

Watcher Headquarters was in a uproar.

That's all Alex could say about it. His mom was just out of Jail today, and that was something he so didn't want to think about. Although he did love his mom, he knew she wasn't a normal mom. But he also knew that she loved him. But he just had his mom and he had enough of a hard time talking to anyone about his mom.

And now she had been locked up again.

To the Slayers that was cool; to the other watcher kids, it just proved that his mom was trash, and trash makes trash, a bastard with a slut for a mom.

Of course, no one said that to his face, but he had heard the whispers. He loved his mom, there was no doubt about that, but it was hard being her kid.

She had taught him how to hot wire a car before he was 6 years old, and he could drive before he was eight. He had learned hand-to-hand from some of the meanest, toughest son of bitches in the world. Buffy's boyfriend had taught him swordsmanship and how to be a gentleman, even when facing someone you hate. After all, you don't have to be vulgar to hate.

He had learned a lot in his short life. Even a few things his mom didn't know about. He even found out that Richard Wilkins, the old Mayor f Sunnydale, had left him a gift: when he graduated from high school, he would have enough money to go to any school he wanted. Wilkins wanted him to go to Miskatonic U, but it would be his choice.

And he really didn't know what he wanted. Though he always thought he would look for his father after he graduated. He knew from stories that if his Dad knew about him, he would be here for him.

Alex sat in Giles' office, playing video games on Giles least used piece of office equipment, his computer. Giles never did like technology - the only thing in his office that made after the 1990's was his computer. Even his phones were rotary. If not for Alex, no one would ever turn on the computer for weeks at a time.

Alex had just gotten to the third level on his game when he noticed his Godmother jump in her seat with a small yelp. Willow had been left to watch the school while Giles and Faith had gone after Bourne. She looked around the office, then, after making sure that Alex was still playing on the computer, she opened her phone. Her face went pale, but then a determined look came over her face. She had been left behind by Giles to watch the school, had been told something about not needing her to fight a normal human, that that Bourne guy was just a normal guy and they didn't need her to endanger herself.

"Alex, I need to go do something. Watch the phones till I get back, ok?" Willow asked as she picked up her bag, her emergency spell bag.

Something's up, Alex thought as watched her turn and leave.

Getting up quickly, Alex followed his Godmother through the school, always staying behind her, using every trick he had been taught.

He was right behind her 'til she left the school grounds, then, after a quick look back, he followed her on to the streets, not noticing a figure detach itself from the shadows across from the main entrance and follow him.

After a short walk up the street, Willow ducked into a Coffee shop. It was not a well-used place - a few girls from school were the only ones that used it. It was a nice place, but just a little too pricey for most people.

From where Alex stood, he could see the entire store front and his Godmother - she had taken a seat in the front window. As he watched, he thought he felt something.

Turning to look back down the alleyway he had chosen to watch Willow from, he looked into the two darkest eyes he had ever saw. A man was standing right behind him, his jacket was open and the butt of a pistol could be seen in a holster at his side.

"Well, come along," the guy said, with a nod of his head toward the coffee shop.

"Uh-uh," Alex said. "Sorry, I don't know you. Mom said not to walk away with strangers."

"You followed Ms. Rosenberg over there," Bourne said with another nod at the Coffee shop. "I am going to talk to her. Come along, boy."

With that, Bourne turned and headed toward the shop he had chosen the shop at random a few hours ago. He had picked Willow as a contact because she was Wicca. The Wicca were a peaceful people, usually; one of their tenets was, do whatever you wanted as long as you hurt no one. That and with the feeling he had gotten when he had saw her at the mall was enough for him to try this contact.

If it didn't work, he would fade away. His past was done; he had a future. Although he wanted to know his past, it wasn't at the cost of his future or the price of killing someone and adding someone else's soul to the burden already on his. Which is exactly what would happen if he kept this up. So, this was the last try.

The kid that slowly walked behind him was out of place; if Willow or the Council had had someone follow her, they would have at least had someone that fit in, but this kid didn't.

First off, he should have been in school, or at least at home on a day like this with the snow still falling. Second, he wasn't dressed for the weather; he had warm clothes, but not warm enough to stay outside for any length of time. And the biggest tell was that he was watching Willow. Not just a glance; he wasn't paying any attention to anything else but her.

Walking into the Coffee shop, Bourne watched Willow's face; emotions played across so fast he couldn't really make out what she was feeling, only the dread as Alex walked in behind him.

She hadn't known. He was sure of it. The boy was there on his own.

But she knew him.

Good. She hadn't tried to set him up. He could work with that.

"Hello," Bourne said, sitting down and looking at Willow, "It's nice to have a face to face with someone who's not trying to put a fist in mine."

"Don't hurt him," Willow said worriedly. "He's an innocent."

"Of course he is," Bourne said. "All children are. For the record, I have never harmed a child or anyone else that didn't deserve it. At least, not when I had a choice."

"You attacked those Slayers," Willow said. " You attacked Faith."

"No," Bourne said with a shake of his head, not noticing the boy stiffen up when he heard this guy attacked his mom, "I only defended myself. Your people attacked first. I only wanted some answers about some things that are very important to me."

"Let Alex go," Willow said firmly, "and I will tell you everything you want to know."

Bourne sat back. Alex? he thought. Faith's son was named Alex.

"You're Alex Wood?" Bourne asked turning toward the boy.

"No," Alex said looking him back in the eyes, a small ember of fire there for the man that hurt his mother. "I'm Alex Harris."

A short while ago, he had decided he was going to change his name back to his biological father's. That way, when he met him, he would be his son in all ways and not that son of the bastard that would hit his mom. He'd just never gotten around to telling his mother or anyone else. But the thought of him being called Alex Wood one more time just pissed him off enough to say it for the first time.

As Alex told Bourne his last name, Willow let out a small groan. This was it. Her hand reached into her bag, pulling out a small crystal.

Bourne tensed. He was shocked. This kid was his?

"Sleep," Willow whispered. When Bourne tensed up, she just knew that he was going to attack Alex. And with a flash, the crystal was gone.

Bourne felt a wave of something run across his mind. Willow - she was a witch, he remembered as he turned to look at her. He looked into her eyes, seeing them widen as he fought the spell, but then his head slowly sank to the table.

"You don't need muscles to take care of yourself," she said looking at Alex. "And we're going to have a long talk about you following me when we get home."

Then as she was pulling out her cell phone, it hit her.

That look. And the feeling in those brown eyes.

She had seen those eyes before.

With the same look of betrayal.

The last time she saw Xan, he had the same look in his eyes.

The night of the fight.

Running her hand through his hair, she felt it again.

A connection.

A feeling of many.

Of being alone.

And at the forefront was...

"Xander?"


	6. Chapter 6

part 7

CLICK. With that sound, Bourne snapped awake but didn't move. He started to catalog what he could feel and sense from the room without opening his eyes.

Soft bed, with a musty smell. And a heater on the floor running, making a lot of noise. Opening his eyes a crack, he could make out a dark room. Cheap furnishings. A no-tell motel, by the looks of the room.

Over by the door, Willow stood with Alex in a heated argument.

"I am not leaving you here with him," Alex was saying with his arms crossed, and a determined look on his face.

"I can handle him," she waved a hand at the prone figure on the bed. "See, he's handled."

"Now. But what if wakes up?" Alex pointed out. "He has taken out Slayers, what chance do you have with him?"

"The same one I had when I took him out," Willow said. "Strength alone is not the answer to everything." She was a little pissed that Alex was putting up this much of a fight.

"I still don't understand, why don't you want to take him back to the Council?" Alex asked.

"I can't go into right now." Willow was hesitant to tell Alex who this could be. "I just need to make sure about something; then we will see."

"But..."

"No," Willow was firm. "You need to go back and tell them what happened. Do you really want to worry your mom?"

"No," Alex said looking down. He would be in enough trouble already, just for following Willow.

"Ok, then go. You can tell them I have Bourne," Willow said with a small smile, "and I will be home later. But I need to find out something first."

After Alex had left, Willow turned and looked at the bed.

"You can open your eyes," Willow told the assassin. "My spell told me when you woke up."

Opening his eyes fully, he sat up and put his feet on the floor to look over at her. Those same dark eyes that she had looked at so much years ago looked back at her for a moment, but then the life seemed to slip out of them.

Looking into them, it seemed as if his eyes were replaced with cameras. They saw everything, but didn't really care. And you just knew that if he wanted, he would kill you and that it really didn't matter to him one way or the other.

"Xander?" Willow asked hesitantly, not really sure if she wanted the answer to be 'Yes' or not.

Was this Xan, or was it the assassin?

And did it really matter?

The face didn't match, but the feeling she was getting from him did.

But then again, they also didn't - like he was shifting who he was, then shifting back again.

"I was told that I was, at one time, Alexander Harris," Bourne said, looking at the redhead. "I don't know if that was true or not."

"Told?" Willow said sitting back in a chair looking at Bourne. "Your face...it's not Xander. But I feel him in you."

"I've had plastic surgery any number of times," the assassin said honestly.

He didn't know why, but he was telling the truth to this stranger, stuff he had never told Marie.

"My face would be come to recognizable, so they would change it. This is my sixth face that I can recall. As to being told, there was someone in the CIA who, while I don't trust her, had no reason to lie to me about who I was."

Getting up Willow walked over to the assassin. As she got closer, a feeling of peace came over him.

"Are you doing something to me?" Bourne asked looking at her with a cool expression. "I've had enough people mess with my mind."

"NO!" Willow jumped and almost screamed, a bad flash back to Tara coming to her mind, "I don't do spells like that without consent, I...I... had a bad experience with those spells."

"I just feel something when you're around, something I have known in a long time." Bourne admitted. "I feel..."

"Like you're home?" Willow asked. She had pretty much the same feelings he'd been describing; it was nothing sexual, just that this person, was a friend beyond all else - you could trust them with anything.

Willow leaned in close to Bourne, looking around his face. Yep, there they were - small scars, almost to small to see, where the surgeons had changed his face. Most blended into the contours of his face, making them almost impossible to make out, but there were a few here and there that couldn't be masked.

"Why do I trust you?" Bourne asked, looking into the redhead's eyes. "I don't know you."

"But Xander did," Willow said with a small smile. "He was my first true friend, my first crush, he was the first boy to see me without clothes on.

"Although we were only six at the time," she noted with a smile. "He was my family when mine didn't care and I was his when his didn't care. We were closer than lovers. I would share my soul with him and he would always accept me, no matter what I did."

"Then why did you turn on him?" Bourne asked, getting flashes of his past as she had talked.

He could see everything she'd spoken of, and more: how hurt he was when she put the blame on him for the fluke in high school; how she didn't tell him about Tara, and how someone he hated was the one to tell him; after that, there was all the fights about him needing to be safe, 'til she no longer talked to him, only at him.

"I don't know what to say," Willow said. "I don't think I turned on him...you. I just want to keep you safe. You could have had a normal life, a normal family. Just been safe."

"Safe? What happened to me wasn't safe." Bourne got up from the bed and started to pace. "Yes, I've seen the world; - but only through the sights of a gun. I have met people, loved a few, and killed most of them."

Bourne paused as the thought of Marie once again crossed his mind. Then just as fast, Faith's face jumped there, and he could feel his heart jump in his chest at the thought of how much she must hate him now.

"I come back to look for who I was and all that I get for my troubles is more people trying to kill me. I have a whole world out there that wants my head. I just wanted some peace - a place where I can relax and not worry about someone trying to kill me."

"I am sorry about that," Willow said. "We protect our own, and you were hunting... well, you."

Bourne stopped and turned to watch the redhead, eyes scanning everything.

"You think I am your Xan?" Bourne asked.

It was a question that had a loaded answer. If she said no, would that mean that she just didn't believe, or did it mean that he wasn't?

And if she said yes, the same still held true.

"I...I...I think so." Willow paused to collect her thoughts. "I feel him in you. But I don't know if he was there first or if it's a copy someone put there. There is a way for me to find out, but I don't know if you would like it."

"What way?" Bourne asked, looking at her as the witch looked down at her feet.

"I did it for Buffy one time," Willow said. "I can enter your mind, and snoop around and see what's there. I should be able to find out what's real and what's been placed there."

Bourne stopped and looked at the witch.

Could he let her in his mind? Could he let another person in his mind?

No, he couldn't and wouldn't let that happen.

But this was his Willow. Though everything told him 'no,' the feelings he had about her told him she wouldn't hurt him, that she was family.

And that one thing stood out, and he trusted her.

"Ok, You can do it," Bourne whispered.

Alex walked slowly back into the main building. He had caught a bus to get back to the compound, thinking and worrying. His Godmother wasn't acting like herself. Why didn't she bring the bad guy here? Why did she want to be alone with the guy? And the biggest why, why did she meet with him in the first place?

As he walked in, the place went silent.

All he had time to think was What...? when he was pulled off his feet by Faith and pulled into a hug. Then she started to scream at him. Where had he been? Why did he run off? Where was Willow? And on and on. Until Grandpa arrived.

"I am glad you escaped," Giles said as he pulled him into a hug. They had arrived home from the courthouse two hours ago, to find both Willow and Alex gone.

After sending the girls out into the neighborhood to find them, thinking that they had gone to get a bite to eat or something. But that was not the case. Witnesses told of how Willow had met with Bourne at the corner coffee shop, where Alex had joined them. And then the whole place had gone to sleep, and the trio were gone when they had woken up.

"Uh," Alex hesitated, looking around. "I didn't escape. Aunt Willow sent me home to tell you she's got Bourne."

There was complete silence after that declaration.

All the Slayers in the room looked at him. His mom looked at him. Giles took off his glasses and began to clean them.

"I'm sorry what did you say?" Giles asked. He was sure that he had not heard the boy right.

Willow had taken down an assassin. One that had taken out one of the Slayer teams in LA, and then ran circles around Faith and the local team here.

"She's got Bourne at a hotel across town," Alex told his grandfather.

"Why didn't she bring him here?" Faith asked, watching her son closely.

"I don't know," Alex told them, the frustration clear in his voice. "She's acting weird around him."

"What do you mean, weird?" Giles asked.

"She was mumbling to herself about what happened to him. She was rubbing his head, moving the hair out of his eyes. Just plain weird."

From his voice, they could tell he didn't understand any more than they did.

"Ok," Giles said, "this can wait. Take us there. Now."

Arriving at the motel room, no one knew what to expect. But whatever they might have expected, it was not the scene that they found there.

Willow and Bourne were laid out on a pallet on the floor. Their feet in opposite directions, and their heads laid out side by side, their shoulders pillowed on the other's head. Giles looked at it and it reminded him of the times that Willow and Xander would lay out on the floor of his apartment after a hard night of Slaying.

As they moved closer, he saw the components on the floor around them, Parts of a spell.

One that he knew Willow wouldn't cast unless it was a dire situation. She looked on what the spell did as kind of a rape. And the danger of using it were great; if it was broken too soon, parts of the caster's mind could be lost.

"What the fuck is she doing?" Faith asked, looking down at the pair.

"She's entered his mind," Giles whispered to his Slayer.

"Why?" Alex asked, equally quietly.

"I don't know," The head Watcher said, while also knowing that if Willow had done this thing of her own free will, it would have been important.

"G," Faith said looking down at the two bodies, one her friend, one... She wasn't sure how he fit into this. He was the enemy, but then again, if her feelings were telling her the truth, he wasn't. "We've got to do something."

"I am afraid not." the Head Watcher told the Dark Slayer, "If we interfere with this spell, it could cause more damage than good. To Willow, at least."

He, too, was concerned with the assassin, but Willow - If they broke the spell, they could loose parts of Willow's mind.

Bourne's mind

Willow stood in a quiet field, rolling hills in every direction she looked. A breeze was blowing her hair around her face and standing next to her was Bourne.

Only he wasn't. His face was gone; it was just a blur, but she knew who it was. But then it also wasn't him.

"Hello," Bourne told the witch. But it wasn't his voice - it was made up of many voices that blended into a kind of harmony.

"Hey, where are we?" Willow asked, looking around once again.

"The price of my life," Bourne said. That was when Willow noticed the ground was not empty but had bumps on it, and at the head of each bump was a marker. They were standing in the middle of a graveyard.

"Are these your victims?" Willow asked, a little scared of the answer. There was so much she wasn't sure about when it came to Bourne. Was this Xander or not?

"Yes, and no." Bourne replied. "They all died because of me. They were picked and I killed them until..."

There was a jump and suddenly, they were standing on a yacht, in the main cabin, and she could see Bourne walking up to a sleeping man. She gasped as Bourne pulled a pistol out and put it to the back of the man's head. Only then did she notice the young girl laid out on her father's chest.

Bourne looked at the girl.

"Kendra?" he whispered and stumbled away, and with a flash, it seemed as though a young woman was there, smiling at him and nervously looking away.

As Bourne stumbled back and away from the man, the man arose and pulled a pistol and fired. Each shot hit Bourne in the back, and then, the impact of the last bullet threw Bourne overboard.

Then they were back in the field, this time in front of beautiful grave marked with white flowers.

"Is this the little girl's?" Willow asked, trying to make sense of the jump, while desperately hoping it wasn't her grave.

"No," he whispered.

They jumped again.

It was a snowy alleyway, and Bourne was talking to a woman across the roof of a car, almost begging her to give him a ride. Even going so far as to offer to pay her.

Next, they were sitting together in a diner. Across from her, Bourne was sitting with the young woman, telling her how he didn't know who he was and what little he knew about the people in the diner with them.

Then another jump and they were back at the grave.

"How did she die?" Willow asked hoping that Bourne hadn't killed the young woman.

Jumping again, they were in a jeep flying across the countryside, and someone was chasing them - someone they had told to leave them alone.

"Who's after you?" Willow asked, but as soon as the words left her mouth, the rear window of the jeep exploded in a shower of broken glass. The head of the woman who was driving flew forward and then she sprawled bonelessly over the steering wheel, causing the jeep to spin out of control.

The next thing she knew, she was standing on the bank of a river, looking out as men pulled the broken jeep from the water. She could hear them yelling to one another as they work.

"Marie," Bourne said standing beside her, "they never found her body. It just floated away."

"Who did this?" Willow asked looking once again at the grave at her feet as the river faded away.

"Treadstone."

Then Willow's mind was assaulted with random images, all of them painful.

Bourne sitting in a room, watching a film, receiving information on a target; sitting in the back of a car, with the driver telling him it no longer training; people screaming, and him looking down at them as they died.

Men. Women. It didn't matter.

And pain. His head hurt, the lights were too bright.

Willow felt tears on her face as she thought of what had been done to her friend...her brother.

Then, as she watched, Ethan Rayne walked out of the shadows.

Willow started to jerk and move on the floor, and little moans escaped her mouth.

"Giles, we've got to do something," Kennedy said, holding her lover's hand. "He's killing her."

"No." Giles almost snapped at the slayer. "If we break the spell, part of Willow's mind could be lost. He can't hurt her; she is in control."

All the while, Giles added silently to himself, "I hope."


	7. Chapter 7

Part 8

"Ahh, the witch," Ethan said as he walked from the shadows, "One of Ripper's little brats."

"You did this to him?" Willow asked, looking at the mage.

"Yes, I did. But it wasn't of my choosing," Ethan said, a look of regret on his handsome face.

"What? The Janus made you do it?" Willow said a smirk on her face.

Bourne watched the two people talk, not saying anything. This was confusing to him. He had people in his mind. And that just rocked him - people having a meeting inside his head. Give him a gun or a knife, that he understood. This was beyond him, and the one thing he had learned in his life was, if you don't understand, watch 'til you do.

"Janus? Wanted me to do this?" Ethan said, waving his arms around at the world - that was what made up Bourne's mind. "This place reeks of order, of discipline. This is no work of his."

"Then why did you do this?" Willow demanded, her eyes boring into the older man.

"Do you know what a bullet from a .45 would do to the human head?" Ethan said, looking off in the distance. "No? I was told if I didn't do this, I would find out. I had to cast this spell over and over again. Even on that Slayer they brought in - give them all new names and sent them out."

"The Slayer, what was her name?" Willow asked, thinking back over the Slayers that had gone missing over the years. It wasn't common, but it did happen. These girls usually ended up in unlamented graves, in dark holes, forgotten. Just a foot note in a journal, But some had turned up on the other side of the line. Those - Faith had had to deal with them.

"Before or after?" Ethan asked. "Not that it mattered - the poor girl was insane when she came to me, a glorious mass of chaos. And they made me place order on her mind. What a waste of a great object of art. Now she's Sydney something or other. I didn't pay much attention to her, after they had me rune her mind. All that interested me was that our boy here was the one to bring her in."

"Dana," Bourne whispered. He had turned her over to them, and they cut her brain apart, much like they had done to him.

"I suppose that could have been her name," Ethan said, not much caring one way or the other.

"Why are you telling us this?" Willow asked.

"Couldn't it be for my love of freedom, and my wishes to make up for a sordid past life?" Ethan said smiling and throwing his arms open wide.

"No, it couldn't," the witch said, looking narrowly at the mage.

"Well, you're completely right," Ethan said the smile dropping from his face. "I want payback."

"You want me to do what?" Willow said,

"Not you," Ethan said turning to look at Bourne. "You," he said, pointing at Bourne.

"Me?" Bourne asked

"Yes. You will kill someone for me," Ethan said smiling once again. "And when you do, I'll give you this." Ethan held up his hand, and in was a silver orb, that swirled and seemed to glow.

"And what's that?" Bourne asked as he looked at the orb. It seemed to call

to him.

"Why, it's you," Ethan said, rolling in his hand. "It's everything that was Alexander Harris."

The world around them seemed to move as Bourne's mind took in the shock of what he was told.

As Faith stood looking down at her friend and Bourne, Alex had moved to stand beside her.

"Mom, I'm sorry," he said taking hold of Faith's hand. "I shouldn't have left her alone with him. She was acting strange."

"Not your fault," Faith said, smiling a sad smile at her son. She knew he would be blaming himself for this. "She would have done this at the council headquarters. If she wanted it, Willow would have found a way."

Just then Bourne let out a small moan.

"Get him, Will," Faith whispered. She just knew that Willow was fighting him.

"So I kill someone and you what, call me and tell me?" Bourne asked.

"No, my dear boy," the Mage oozed, a slimy smile on his face. "I'll be here all the time and when you kill, it will open like a flower. I have been letting out bit and pieces to get you here. So when you kill for me, I will give you what you want."

"What do you mean?" Willow asked, not trusting the mage for one second.

"Simply put," the chaos worshiper said. "I'm dead, just a message from the grave, so to speak. When they killed me, this copy of me came into being."

Ethan watched the two take in what he said, and hoped they would buy it. He wanted payback; he would strike back at them with a weapon of their own creation, and the Chaos he would spread would please Janus and make up for the order he placed in the minds of the bastards that were brought before him.

"Who?" was all Bourne said.

"No." Willow said, "We're good guys; we don't kill."

"Unlike you did, my dear?" Ethan said looking at her. "Does the name 'Warren' mean anything to you?"

"That was a long time ago," Willow said almost to herself. "I was in a bad place. I am not. now. I am not that person. anymore."

Then. looking at the replica of Ethan with narrowing eyes, "I can remove you."

"No, you can't," Ethan said. "You take me out his mind, and it will fall apart. I am the glue that is keeping him together. His mind shattered on the night he broke from his programming. And without me, he would have died or went back to Treadstone. Either way, he wouldn't be here. I need him to do this and then I am gone. But I will make sure his mind is fixed before I leave."

Once again he held up the Orb. "Anything after that would be his own choice."

"Will," Bourne said, looking at the red head. "It's something I have to do. I need to know who I was."

"No," Willow was adamant, even with a death under her belt from Warren. "We're good guys; we don't kill." She didn't want to have her brother add another one on his soul.

"You're good," Bourne said. "Me? Not so much. I am a bad man. I have done horrors you can't even imagine. I bring death wherever I go. Just let me go. I have to do this. I need to know."

With a look, she was defeated. Those eyes. His eyes. She would let him go. Once, he listened to her sins and took her back. Though his were bigger, could she do any thing less?

"Just come back," she told him.

Willow's eyes opened first. Then she jumped up just as Bourne stated to move.

"Where're you going, Micky?" Faith asked, holding a set of handcuffs.

"I'm leaving now," Bourne said. Then he looked at Willow. "But I will be back."

"No," Kennedy said, moving up behind Faith. "I don't think so. This is the end of the line for you. You hurt my girl."

Giles sat moved behind Bourne, his hand reaching into his jacket. Ever since the Boom note, he had started to carry his old pistol, the Webley, while an old gun, was still very deadly.

This move did not go unnoticed by the red headed witch.

"Bourne?" Will whispered. She knew this was once Xan, but he now thought of himself as Bourne. So as much as she wanted to call him by his name, she would bend to what he wanted for now.

"I just want this over, Will," Bourne said, as the others moved in. "I will not come in by force."

That made up her mind. She knew he wouldn't hurt them, if he had another way, but he would to stay free. And they might hurt him, trying to take him in. She knew that Giles and the rest wouldn't believe her fast enough if she told them. She knew her family. They would attack him, drag him back to headquarters, then listen. And from what she now knew from Bourne's brain, that would be bad.

He wouldn't come along quietly. Most likely, he would hurt someone trying to free himself, or be hurt himself. Either way would be unacceptable.

Willow took a deep breath, and then, with a wave of her hand, the room stopped. Everyone but her and Bourne.

"Go," she told the assassin, then pulled him into a hug, much to the surprise of everyone else. Because although they couldn't move, they were aware of what was going on.

Bourne hugged her back, a little stiffly. "I'll be back."

"I know," the redhead said. "Please, don't do this. Please?"

"I have to," Bourne said holding Willow tightly. "I need to know."

"I could help you," Willow said, looking up into the taller man's eyes, "You don't have to do this. You know it's wrong."

"Will," Bourne said looking at her. "You heard him. He's holding my mind together. I do this, then I'm free."

"No. You do this and it's another dark stain on your soul, one that you placed there," Willow said. "It's one more step in the wrong direction. Please, don't do this."

"I have to." Bourne pulled himself away from the woman, then looked around that the group, the people that were his family once, but who were now nothing more than a room full of strangers.

Then he was gone. Once he was out of the door, Willow dropped the spell and her friends, her family could move again.

"Willow, why?" Giles asked, only to have the redhead start to cry and hold on to him.

"They hurt him so much," she gasped out between sobs, "and it was our fault. It was all our fault. If we had listened to him, he wouldn't be like that."

"Who?" Faith asked. This was not making sense in the least. Willow hugging her man. Wait a minute - her man? Faith thought. Where did that come from?

But the hacker turned witch could only sob. Her brother he was walking away from them again. And she just knew he wouldn't be back.

Later that day.

Bourne was sitting by the window on the train. He kept getting flashes of a face and a place that he knew were from the Wizard in his head.

"Alright Harvey," he whispered to himself, so focused on what Willow had told him, about this being wrong that he almost didn't hear the voice of a young woman as she asked if the seat beside him was taken.

"No," Bourne said. While his voice wasn't friendly, it wasn't hostile either. Someone sitting with him would not attract attention, but would add a layer to his concealment. Looking at the beautiful young woman as she sat down, he knew she would also attract attention and keep it away from him.

But he didn't want her to get to friendly with him. He needed to keep his mind on the mission: to kill Jack Ryan, the head of the CIA. The one that pulled all the strings.

"So," the brunet asked seating beside him, "where are you going?"

"Washington," Bourne replied before once again shutting down.

"Work or for family?" she asked again. Bourne looked at her, really looked for the first time. Intelligence shone from her.

"Work," Bourne slipped into one of his personas. "I'm a lawyer, got a big case coming up. I have a lot of files that I have to go through once I am in the home office."

"Too bad," the woman said with a nod of her head. "Family is very important. You don't want to walk away from it if you can help it."

All the while he was talking to the woman, Ethan was telling him to shut up and stop talking to her. But a peace came over him as they spoke. He trusted her. She was his friend.

"Why are you going to kill that man?" she asked.

"I need to find out who I was." Bourne felt himself answering even before he thought about it.

"Is that more important than who you are now?" she asked, a smirk crossing her beautiful face.

"I need to know," he whispered.

"You were a boy. A good boy, but still a boy. You grew up in a broken home. And even though you thought you weren't popular, you had lots of friends. Friends that would do anything to protect you. You broke hearts, and mended them. A joker when it was needed and a protector, also. You stood up to some of the greatest evils in the world and made jokes about it. That's who you were, Dweeb," the woman said with a smile.

"But I don't know that. It's just what people tell me." Bourne said, looking a little lost. Why was he telling this woman this stuff? How did she know about him?

"Xan, you always were a little slow," the woman said, still smiling. "Cute but slow. You're being lied to you. He's part of your mind, right?"

When Bourne nodded, she went on. "And he has who you were in a little ball?"

Once again, the assassin nodded. "Then it's all right here," She said as she poked him between the eyes. "He's not letting out the memories, they're coming out on their own. And someday, they will all be out."

"But why tell me..." Bourne was confused; this woman knew more about him than she should and it didn't feel wrong to him. And she was telling him more and more about himself than she could possibly know.

While part of his mind of his mind was ok with it, another part was screaming that she was dangerous and he needed to get away or kill her. But he couldn't. He was compelled to sit there and talk.

"Because he wants a way back," the woman lost her smile. "He wants another servant. If you follow him, soon, sooner than you realize, you would be in a dark place. You will doing things that made your time with Treadstone look like a pleasant memory. You have fought so hard to get out, you've found your family. Don't blow it.

"Because of who you were and what you did, the powers are giving you a chance. You'll only get one chance and this is it."

"Who are you?" Bourne asked.

"No one that important, now," The woman said with a smirk. "I'm here to talk to you. The other side had a chance to talk you into doing something blockheaded, and now it's our turn."

"Talk about what?" Bourne looked around, to see if anyone was within hearing distance, only to notice the train car was empty. And had been for a while.

"Xan, if you kill this guy, the Dark Side wins," the woman begun again. "Jack's is one of the good guys. He would never have stood for what was done to you. The others in Treadstone came willingly. You didn't.

"You do this and your theirs again. But this time, you will be killing anyone that would get in the way of your new master. Your family chose and their choices put you on the other side of where you will be. Do you want to kill Willow? Faith? Or how about your son?"

"No, I wouldn't hurt them," Bourne began.

"You wouldn't have a choice," the woman said, a small sad frown on her face. "They would come after you."

"I need to know who I am," Bourne said, looking down at his hands. Those hands that had killed so many people.

"You know who you are," the woman said with a smile, "You're Jason Bourne, a young man who has done dark things, but who is looking to find peace. Someone who is lost and who has found his family, but who at this very moment is at a crossroads. One way will lead to love and peace, and the other to darkness and hate. It's your choice. You know what you need to do. You just have to do it."

With that, the woman got up and started to walk away.

"Who are you?" Bourne asked the woman as she walked away.

"You know me," she said with a smile and walked out into the next car.

The name flowed over Bourne as she walked away.

"Cordy."

Faith sat in the park that made up the front of the Council headquarters.

It was a bomb shell that Red had dropped. It had taken them hours to get it out of her, but when they had, it still was a big bomb.

Bourne was Xander.

Xander had been taken and then he was turned into a killer. A killer that made her short time on the dark side look like a hike in the park. And he was going to kill one more person, this time of his own free will.

Had the Xander she knew changed so much that he could do that? How did it affect how she felt for him?

Over the years, she had grown to love the man who her mind had made him out to be: the one who had moved away, who had gotten a job. Maybe, no matter how much it bothered her, gotten married. Who got away from the dark.

Not this one that killed and ran from the law.

"Man troubles?" a French accented voice asked.

"What?" Faith asked looking up. A calm feeling washed over her as she looked up at thin brunette woman.

"You're sitting outside and it's twenty-eight degrees," the woman said, a warm smile on her face. "So it's either a man or it's something a man has done."

"Don't want to talk about it," Faith snapped, looking down once again, the dark thoughts in her head going around and around.

"Sure, you do." The woman sat beside her and, strangely, Faith felt like she did.

"It's just this guy," Faith found herself saying. "I found out something about him. It's kind of messed with my head."

"Yes," the woman said nodding her head, "men can do that. Part of what I like about them. It makes every day and adventure."

"I don't want any more adventures with men," Faith said emphatically.

"Where would the fun be in that?" the woman said, with a small laugh. "They're an adventure, while we women are a mystery. It's what makes the world worth

living."

"Living? I don't have a life," Faith said, "just dreams. And they're not even mine," she said, thinking back over her hopes and dreams for the missing boy, which now had turned into nightmares.

"Yes, you do, Faith," the woman said looking hard at the Slayer. " And you deserve to be happy. The powers want to reward you, you've came a long way. He can make you happy if you let him."

"He's not here!" Faith all but screamed at the woman.

"That's true. But he will be back. Remember, you're the mother of his child.

And if YOU want him, you have to let him know," the woman smiled. "He is as lost as you are. And he needs someone strong. Someone to help him find his way. But again, it's your choice."

"I don't know," Faith whispered. Could she be the strong one? The one that leads, shows the path of redemption?

The woman smiled, and got up from the bench. This would be Faith's choice.

"What's your name?" Faith asked the woman as she moved away.

"Marie," she said over her shoulder, walking away.

She hoped both Bourne and Faith would make the right choice.


	8. Chapter 8

Part 9

Alex sat on one of the many weight-benches in the gym. He had been there for an hour, an hour when he thought his life had gone to hell.

He had found his dad. Or rather, his dad had found him.

And daddy dearest was a killer. Worse than a killer - a serial killer.

Soon, the room began to fill with people. Watchers in training working weights and running, while Slayers were fighting and weapons training. With Alex watching them all, while not really seeing them.

Across the room, Sherry was watching Alex.

He had not moved for at a while, just staring around at the room. At first she thought he was watching Misty as she bounced around the room. And with Misty - she really bounced. The girl bounced sitting still. Misty made all the other girls feel self-conscious in the showers. Sherry looked down at her own chest and wished once again that she had a little more there than what she had. And she ran to pick up a fallen sword, and saw Misty bend to pick her own up, Sherry wished she could fill out her shorts as well as Misty did that, too.

Looking back at Alex, he was still sitting there and hadn't even noticed Misty bend, not like most of the male WITs had. Looking over at the coach who was leading the training, she nodded toward Alex, and after receiving an ok nod, she moved toward Alex. He didn't even look up at she moved up beside him.

"Why the long face, Loser?" Sherry asked in the slight accented voice of hers causing Alex jump and almost fall over.

"Its nothing, carrot top." Alex said with a small smile.

"Sure," Sherry said with a raised eyebrow. "You didn't even blink when old Misty mountains over then nearly fell out of her top doing hand stands."

"Ohh, she did?" Alex looking around to check the other girl out.

"You freak!" Sherry said with a laughing tone as she slapped his shoulder.

"Me, a freak?" Alex said smiling. "I'll have you know I have worked long and hard on being a perv."

"That's what I always liked about you," Sherry said, her smile turning into something that made Alex's stomach jump.

"What?" Alex wasn't quite sure why he felt like he was walking a tight rope.

"That you get long and hard, being a perv."

"Gahhh!" was all that came out of Alex's mouth while he was imitating a fish.

"Score one for the redhead," Sherry laughed.

"You –"Alex said, smiling once again.

"There, there's the famous Alex smile," Sherry said smugly. "So what's up? You looked like you have cancer of the puppy."

"I found my dad," Alex in a small voice.

"That's great!" Sherry said, but when Alex didn't say anything or even look at her, she asked, "Isn't it?"

"Yeah, right." Alex said with a snort. "I find my dad and he turns out to be a black hat."

"What?"

"My dad's name is Jason Bourn, the assassin. The one that beat my mom up, that the Council has been looking for. A bad guy!"

"How..." This was a shock, and the young Slayer really didn't know what to say about this. She'd had so many 'Your mom's not a slut talks' she couldn't count, but 'Your dad's not an assassin' – well, that was a new one.

"Aunt Willow, she got into Bourns brain and found out who he is, then She LET him get away to go kill some one." The rage in his voice clear for her to hear.

"I am sure she had her reasons," Sherry said, trying to calm her friend down. "She never would let anyone get hurt if she could stop it."

"She already has. He's gone. Or didn't you hear that part?" Alex all but snarled at his friend.

"Calm down, tiger. Friend here, remember?" Sherry said, drawing back from Alex.

"Sorry," Alex said, looking down at his feet. This was his friend; one of his true friends - someone he could turn to no matter what and would always be there for him.

"That's ok. Just remember that I'm your friend, not a punching bag. Unless you want to take it out on the floor," she told him, nodding out on the mats, where Misty was slamming another Watcher in training to the ground, then falling on him to pin him to the mat. Not that the guy in question looked like he was too mad about the girl laying on him.

"Uh...Not right now," he said, a blush moving up on his face. There was no way he would tell his friend about the dreams he had been having with her, that had them in the same places but with a whole lot less clothing.

"So, where is your mom and Willow?" Sherry asked, biting her lips. She had not seen either one of them, and with Alex acting this way, she needed help and the only ones she could think of were his family.

"They're gone," Alex replied. "Both packed up and gone this morning. I suppose that they couldn't deal with the ideal of their Xan as a murderer."

It took all her courage to walk up to the door, much less knock on the door. She knew Giles had an open door policy that anyone could come to him at any time, and no one would question it.

But this? She felt like she was ratting out a friend.

But as Sherry moved toward the door, she noticed it was open and she could hear Giles talking to someone on the phone.

"Yes, he's on the move. Willow was able to determine the target."

"–"

"Jack Ryan." Giles paused. "Yes, that one."

" I am sure you can do something, Riley. But don't hurt him if you can."

"–"

"From what we can work out, part of his conditioning will not let him stop once he is targeted on someone. The last time cause a psychotic break that he still hasn't recovered from."

"–"

"Yes, if you have to, kill him. But please don't, if you can take him down any other way."

Sherry slowly dropped her arm and moved away from the door. This couldn't end any way but bad. If they killed Alex's dad, he would never forgive them. No matter what his dad had done, he still was his dad.

Shaking her head, she turned and walked back to the showers. She'd get a long hot shower, then she would hunt up her friend and take him out somewhere and have a good time. She didn't think he would have many good times any time soon. So she was going make sure at least today was a good one.

Bourne stood in the park. Across the small pond, Jack Ryan was walking along the promenade. His security team doing what they did best - blend in. Most people wouldn't have even noticed them. The guy over there was jogging, but he never was out of sight of Ryan, and the bulge on his lower back was just the outline of a service weapon. Most likely a nine millimeter, but it could be a forty five.

Then there was the woman with the baby stroller following Ryan. not once had she checked on her baby, but she had watched everyone that had gotten within 10 feet of Ryan.

And don't forget the maintenance crew on the lawn mowers that never finished their area before moving to the next one to stay close to Ryan. The crew was good, Bourne would give them that, but they still hadn't noticed him.

As he watched Ryan walk, the CIA head was talking to a small boy - his son, Jack Jr., if the records were correct. The more the man talked to the boy, the more the pistol in his pocket got heavier and heavier.

But he had his mission, he had to set things right.

Willow looked over at Faith. The dark-haired woman was sitting across from her eating breakfast.

"How far behind him are we?" Faith asked, when she noticed the redhead looking at her.

"Not far. He's in the city," the Red Witch said with a shrug. "That's the best I can do, and if I was any farther away, I wouldn't even have that."

"Then it looks like we patrol," Faith said looking at her friend. "We know who he's after so we know where he's going to show."

Next day

Jack walked the park. He needed to get out of the office, burn off the feelings that built up in him after a day in the office. He would walk the park to purge his mind of those dark feeling and urges, the ideal that he had sent someone to their death or ordered someone killed. He never wanted to bring the office home.

But the last three days he couldn't. Not after he'd been contacted by a Riley Finn, a top agent in a war that was darker than even his war, with a warning that an assassin was after him.

Jason Bourne. That name had sent his security detail into overdrive, moving his wife and kids into a controlled townhouse, having teachers brought in for the kids, even having their friends driven over to play, but never letting them out.

It was difficult for them, but it was better than a madman taking them or hurting them, just to get to him.

His wife would still go to the hospital to work, even see some of her patients, but only under controlled conditions. She was not pleased, and she let him know it, repeatedly. So these little walks were needed. If not for him, for his marriage.

George Markus walked beside his boss. He had been part of the detail for five years and he was damned if something would happen to the Boss on his watch. Even if he was being stupid. As these walks were.

Just as they reached the half way mark, a gun shot rang out, and at the same time his ear piece filled with static as his radio when out. George pulled Jack to the ground and pulled his service weapon, trying to aim in all directions at once, while hoping the pick-up vehicle would get there fast.

Just then a dark van pulled up and the side door opened, a dark haired man at the wheel and a black man holding the door open. George got to his feet pulling Jack up as he went, then pushing him into the van. Only ,as he got moved to follow, the van sped away. As the van cleared out of sight, the jamming that had blocked out the radios cleared.

"Pick up is down!" the driver called out as he tried again to get the van to move.

George once again looked the way his boss had been taken. "I am so dead."

Jack felt himself pulled into the van and the black agent slam the door behind him, in the face of George. Jack tried to pull himself up only to have the black man push him back down, then he felt a pin prick on his arm, and his ears seemed to be stuffed with cotton and he was sliding down a dark hallway.

"Sorry, man," a voice called as he slid into the darkness. "It's just business."

The hour following the kidnapping of Jack Ryan, Washington was in arms. Within two hours, the whole of the USA was on a manhunt. Within three hours, it had gone international.

Every agency knew who had taken him, but not why.

Bourne killed. Period.

But this was surprisingly bloodless.

To say that the American government was having a bad day was an understatement.

Between the CIA and the FBI, they had kept the kidnapping from making it to the press, but everyone knew it would come out, sooner or later. Either by a leak or when Jack's body turned up.

The only one that was smiling about it was one Pamela Landry. From her time tracking Bourne, she knew that he was slipperier than an eel and would only be found when he wanted to be found. Even though he had taken her boss hostage, she knew he wasn't a killer and if he had taken someone, it was either to help them or help someone else. If he came after you, you were dead; so if her boss wasn't dead in the park, Bourne hadn't killed him.

All she could do was file her reports on Bourne and what he would most likely do, then sit back to watch as the brightest agents on the FBI and CIA matched wits with the best field assassin that she had EVER seen.

Just as she sat back, her phone ran.

Faith stood in the command center, surrounded by agents, all of them with one thing on their mind: Capture or kill Xander.

Her Xander. She had built this wonder world around a man she didn't know any more. The Xander she knew wouldn't hurt a human. A Demon he would, in a heart beat. But a human? No way.

But he had. Lots of them, if the records were to be believed.

And the kicker was, she did. Riley stood across the room from her, going over records.

It had been a slow build to get at least a working relationship with the man,

after what she had done to him. She was glad he would even be in the same room with her.

But they had gotten over their problems for the greater good. What had happed would never be forgotten, but they could work together.

Riley had been talking to the blonde bitch for a while now. The Bitch had shown up a few hours ago and almost smiled with every report that came in. It was like she was rooting for her boss to be dead.

Then Faith had overheard an agent talking about her. Pamela Landry had almost caught Bourne in Germany, then let him go, filing her reports saying that Bourne wasn't a threat if he was left alone.

And now he had her boss. Riley had talked to her for an hour before walking away, shaking his head.

"What's up?" Faith asked when he was close to her.

"Nothing," Riley said, looking at the dark Slayer. "That's the problem. He just grabbed one of the most powerful and well-liked men in the US and, then just faded from sight. Like he was a ghost."

"Nope," Faith told the agent. "Just well trained."

"Not that it matters," Riley said looking down at picture of the Ryan Family. "He's dead. Or as good as."

"I don't think so," Faith said looking at the picture as well. "If my boy wanted him dead, he would be dead right there. He took him. So he needs the King Spook for something. What it is, I couldn't tell ya."

"You and Willow said he was coming to kill Jack," Riley said looking sharply at Faith.

"I told you what Red said," Faith said with a shake of her head, causing her dark hair to flip across her shoulders. "He didn't tell me anything."

Just then Landry's cell phone rang. She glanced out the windows of the office, familiar feelings coming over her.

"Hiya, Pam." Bourne's voice came to her over the phone.

"Hello, Jason."

As she said that name, all work in the room came a stop. Riley looked at Landry, who nodded her head. With that nod, Riley snapped out orders, and agents jumped into action.

Faith moved to stand near the woman agent and watched her. With her Slayer hearing, she could just make out the voice on the phone line.

"How's it going?" Bourne asked. He was watching Pam as he talked to her on the phone. He could make out Pam's eyes as she searched the building across from her. He knew she was looking for him. He had used this tactic a little to much. But it was fun. He noticed movement at her side as Faith moved next to Pam, and then Riley moved to her other side.

"Just fine," Pam replied her eyes, scanning the buildings across the street from her. She knew it was pointless, there was just too many windows and roof tops for him to hide behind. "Where's my Boss?"

"He's fine," Bourne said, "I will let him go in a few days. I just need to talk to him."

"Yeah," Pam said. "You know, you could have just gotten an appointment with him."

"Yes, I can see that happening. I have not harmed him or am going to harm him. Could you put Faith on?"

"Faith?" Pam asked as the woman next to her stiffened. Riley was shaking his head 'no' as he watched.

"Yes," Bourne said with a smile.

"Phone for you," Pam said as she handed the phone to the dark-haired woman standing next to her.

"Why did you do that?" Riley asked, watching Faith talking on the phone. "You could have kept him on the line longer for the trace to run on him."

"He's watching us," Pam said looking at the blond agent. "Don't you read your reports?"

"You don't know that."

"Faith?" Pam asked the Slayer. "Could you ask Bourne to tell me what color shirt Riley is wearing?"

"Sure," the Slayer said uncertainly. After she asked, she could almost hear a smile in her Xan's voice as he told her. As she told the room, all eyes snapped toward the windows.

"I had suggested that we at least put curtains up in these rooms," Pam reminded Riley with a smile.

Faith just shook her head and went back to the phone.

"So you can see me?" she asked.

"Yes. You look beautiful, but tired," Bourne told her, then asked, "Why did you come?"

"Don't want you to do anything stupid. It's a woman's duty to make sure her man doesn't do anything stupid."

"Your man?" Bourne was caught almost flat footed by that. He expected at least she wouldn't want to see him again. That she would keep his son from him.

"Yeah," Faith almost whispered. She looked around the room, almost ducking her head as the room was watching her. This was a turn that no one in the room thought would happen.

"I told you and Willow that I would be back and I meant it. I need to fix something that I did."

"What?" Faith asked. She knew from the reports that Riley had let her read Bourne had done a lot of badness.

"I have a lot to make up for but this is a first step." With that, he hung up his phone.

Taking one more look at woman in the widow, he recalled the train ride. She could make him happy if he let her, but did he deserve it?

Three days later.

Willow was desolate.

Xan had done it. He had killed a good man and she didn't know how to take it.

Xan was not a killer but he really was. If he had killed in self defense, she could take that, but he had hunted down someone that had noting to do with what had happened in his life.

She sat in the dark of her room. While Faith had run with the FBI and Riley's group looking for Xander, she had hunted him with magic. She never got a lock on him, he was always moving. They did pick up the guy that helped him, an agent that had been let go from the CID and had started work as a mercenary, but then, nothing. Both Xander and Jack Ryan had disappeared off the face of the earth.

The only thing was that Jack's wife had found a letter in her bedroom from Jack saying he was ok and would be back.

Everyone though that Jack was dead, and that the letter was a delaying tactic, but Willow knew better. She knew Xander and, deep down, she knew that he would not do something that mean, that cruel to the Ryan's family.

She looked out the window of her apartment; she had taken one off the Council grounds so she could have peace and quiet away from the kids. Most of the Slayers in training didn't really think she was that special, and most thought of her only as Kennedy's girl friend. But a lot of the Witches and Mage's in training looked at her with something akin to hero worship, and Willow was still enough of the shy girl to be freaked out about it.

Just then, there was a knock at her door. She opened the door and there he stood: her Xander.

"Did... did you kill him?" Willow asked her voice almost breaking.

"No," Bourne replied, looking at the redhead, "He's very much alive. Right now, he should be talking to Giles."

"About what?"

"A lost Slayer," Bourne drew himself up. "Dana. I was the one to turn her over to Treadstone."

"I know," Willow said, moving back into her apartment.

Bourne stepped into the room and looked around. It was neat and well ordered; books lined the walls and plants hung from hooks all around the room. Here and there, he could almost feel weapons, a slight bulge in the a wall hanging where a sword was, an piece of modern art work and hidden in it was a sliver trench knife, the knuckles covered in holy symbols. There were a few others spread out throughout the room, as well.

"I brought her back. Jack's making arraignments for her to meet with the Council." Bourne looked at his could-be-again sister. "If she chooses to come in, then she will be allowed, but if not, Jack will be taking care of her."

"But she's a Slayer." Willow said in a confused voice.

"Yes, she is, and more than likely, she will come back. But I will not take a slave and free it, only to turn it over to another master. She didn't have it as hard as I did; they gave her a family and memories. A place where she belonged. I was just a weapon. She was a spy."

Willow sat back from the hard edge in his voice.

"Why did you come here?" Willow asked as she looked at the man before her. She still could see the Assassin, but at the same time, a little of her Xan was standing there as well.

"You used to be my friend. At least, to who I used to be. I would like to try and be that again. But I am not who I used to be. I might become him again, but then again, I might not. If you don't want that or me around, you will never see me. I just want all the cards on the table between us.

"I feel... I feel like I owe you that."

"Xan.."

"That's not my name. I'm Bourne. Jason Bourne. It's all I have in the world that I know is mine, 100. Like I said, I am not Xander."

"Jason," Willow said a pleading look in her green eyes. "I want to get to know you again. I want to tell you who were, and be here for who you'll be come."

"Ok," Jason said. "A new start?"

"A new start," Willow said, smiling at Jason.

"Let's go to the Council, so you can met your family?"

"Sure."


	9. Chapter 9

Part 10

The Gym was full of teenage girls, most of them in the middle of their morning sparring, when Willow walked in. Bourne walked through the door behind Willow.

After a quick look around, Willows voice all but rang in the air, "Girls, clear out."

Kennedy was watching them closely from across with gym. She knew from the rumors running around the school that Bourne had been there this morning and dropped some people off in the main offices, and then had faded, gone before the Slayers on the morning watch could pull together to find him.

Then word from Giles came down that Bourne was not to be bothered. He had brought in a lost Slayer, who at this very moment was settling into a room to think about staying. Whether Dana wanted to stay with the CIA or come here would be left entirely up to her.

Now, he was back with her girl, who was smiling and happier than she had seen her in a long time. As the girls filed out, each looking over Bourne as they left, 'til it was only Willow and Kennedy each looking at the other.

"You ok?" Kennedy asked, looking at her lover.

"Sure," Willow said with a smile, "I have my Xan back. Well maybe, soon, maybe not. He's my brother, and he's back. That's all that matters. Uh, do you know where Faith is?"

"Yeah, come on, I'll take you to her." Kennedy pulled Willow close then, with a sharp look at Bourne that could have meant anything before she walked Willow out of the room. "Jason?" Willow asked, looking back over her shoulder as she was pulled toward the door.

"I'll be right here," Bourne answered the unasked question before the redhead was forced out the door.

A few minutes after the gym doors closed, they were pushed open and in walked a group of girls. Most of them only just in their teens and at the lead was the redhead he recalled seeing with his son the last time he'd been here.

"Ladies," Bourne said, looking them over. Was this some kind of set up?

"Man," Sherry said, her voice was strong, but he could something in her eyes. What, exactly, he couldn't make out, "You hurt him, or her, they won't find enough to bury." with as much menace as she could say.

"Ok," Bourne agreed, a small smile on his face. "Don't plan on hurting them."

"Doesn't matter if you meant it or not," Sherry said, pulling herself up into her impressive 5 foot 2 height. "You do ANYTHING out of line, you'll answer to me." Then, when one of the girls behind her coughed, she added, "To us, anyway. Faith is…special to us. She shows us what we can be. That even if we fail, we can always find our way back. And Alex…" she said, a smile crossing her face, "he is ours. That's all that matters. You hurt them, you're dead. And we have enough shovels to make a very deep hole."

Faith was sitting in one of the back drawing rooms, a bottle of beer in one hand and the remote to the TV in the other, flipping through the stations, never really looking at one before moving to the next one. Xan had been here this morning and didn't wait around to see her. He just took off. She really didn't know what to make of her feelings on that. On one side, she was relived, on the other, it hurt her. He had told her he would come back, but he hadn't even hung around to see her.

"Men," Faith snorted and flipped the channel again, and stopped on the Lifetime network. She watched for a few minutes 'til the plot of the show fell out: a man ran out on the lady but the lady wants the man back.

"No way would I be that fucking stupid," Faith mumbled to herself, which caused her to think about Bourne…Xander… again.

Gripping the beer bottle tightly, the thought ran across her mind, He left me again. And here I sit, waiting for him like that dumb bitch on TV. Her eyes narrowed and she drew the beer bottle back and was just about to launch it at the TV when the door opened and Willow stuck her head in.

"Got a surprise for ya," Willow said with a grin.

"It's not another spelled vibrator, is it?" Faith asked. Willow had given both Buffy and Faith vibrators a few years ago, when both the Slayers were going through a dry spell. The toys felt and moved like the real thing. And it just freaked the hell out both women – it was like having a dismembered person in them. And that was all they would say on the matter. Not to mention, the life-like orgasms that the toys had.

Willow blushed. "You guys are never going to let me live that down. It was a mistake and I thought you'd like it."

"Will," Faith said standing up and grinning at her, "any time I need a penis, I still want it attached to a body."

"Well," Willow said, smiling back at her, "It just so happens I have one still attached to someone in the gym."

"He's back?" Faith asked, looking sharply at her friend.

"Yep-per." Willows said, a smile wide on her face.

"Be right back," Faith told Willow and headed out of the room. First, she needed to stop by her room, then hit the gym.

Alex was in his bedroom next to his mother's when she came storming in. He watched his mother move about the den and dinning area 'til she picked up a box. She looked in, then snapped it close and left, almost running. Now he was used to his mom acting strange, running around at all hours, but still, this was the middle of the afternoon and she was up to something. So he did what he always did to find out what was going on when he mother was being secretive: he followed her down the north stairwell.

Training grounds? he thought to himself.

He knew these stairs only went there, the gym, and the weapons areas. Places that were all well-hidden from passer-bys. Just as he hit the bottom of the stairs, he saw that his mom had caught up with his Aunt Willow, who just smiled and pulled her toward the gym. Just as the two women arrived at the door to the gym, a group of Slayers came out and he saw Sherry at the end of the group, looking over her shoulder.

"Remember what we said," she called back into the gym, then seemed to notice Willow and Faith.

Willow was giving the girls her stoic look, but even from this distance he could see the smile in her eyes, while Faith was looking between the girls and the witch with an upraised eyebrow. You could almost see the caption saying, "What the hell?" running over her head, as the girls cleared off, heading toward the target field.

"Shovel talk?" Faith asked as the Slayers moved off.

"Shovel talk," Willow confirmed, pushing open the door.

Inside the gym, Bourne gave the departing girls a bemused smile. He'd had a lot happen to him over the years, but to have a group of teenage girls threaten him? Well, that was new. And kind of nice in a weird way. Because they wanted to protect his…family. Not that he really could call them that. He was just the sperm donor. He hadn't been there for anything in the boy's life. Or the mother's. It wasn't fair, but it was the truth. Just as the girls left, Willow and Faith walked in, both smiling at each other. But Faith's smile dropped at the sight of Bourne.

"They talk to you about shovels?" Faith asked in a disinterested voice.

"Yes," Bourne relied with a smile, "and body dismemberment, also."

"That's Sherry," Willow said, "Always ahead in her class."

"She's very protective you, Faith." And then added with a look of wonderment, "And my son."

"Don't know about that, stud," Faith said looking at Bourne. "His Dad was Xander. You ain't him."

"Well," Willow said, looking between the two, "you guys have a lot to talk about. I can trust you not to kill each other, right?" she asked her green eyes looking into Faith and Bourne's eyes.

"Sure," Faith said with a shrug like this really didn't matter, while all the time her insides were all twisted around. Deep in her soul a voice sang out, See! He did come back!, while her brain was still saying he was just going to leave again. Or try to change her, then hurt her, like Wood did.

Outside the gym, Alex had just managed to get up enough courage to open the door when his Aunt walked out.

"Alex?" Willow asked, looking back over her shoulder. "What are you doing here?" She didn't think it would be a good time for him to walk in. Soon, yes. But the two in the gym needed to come to terms with each other. Much like she and Bourne had done.

"What's going on?" Alex asked.

"Your mom is meeting someone," Willow said, putting herself between the door and Alex.

"Who?" Alex asked, standing straighter. "Your dad."

"The murderer?" Alex exclaimed, then started to move toward the Gym.

"Stop," Willow said forcefully. "She's not in danger. And you need to calm down."

"Calm down?!?" Alex cried. "There's a murderer in there with my mom. A murderer who hurt her. Who kidnaped you. And you just let him walk back in here? "

"I can't defend what he had done, Alex," Willow said looking at the young man, as she remembered a time when the world was just as black and white. But she had to grow up a lot since then and grew into a world where there was a lot gray. And it was kind of sad, she admitted. But that was the nature of things; people that did the things she had done lose that sense of right or wrong or they ended up dead. Or worse.

"He killed people! There is no defense to that! He is evil!"

"Alex?" Willow asked softly. "Am I evil? Is Grandpa Giles evil? Or what about your mom? We all have killed. Your mom was on the dark side while she was carrying you. Giles killed someone who couldn't defend himself, and even though he was carrying something that would ended the world if he let it out, he still killed a helpless man. Me, I killed for revenge and the enjoyment of power. "Are we evil?"

"What? No," Alex said, swallowing. "You guys are the good guys."

"No. We're people. Just normal people. Each of us has made mistakes, and we each have to do things that we don't like, to bring a little darkness into ourselves. But your dad had something done to him. People took away who he was and poured him into someone else, someone completely different than the man he was. Yes, he has done bad things, even evil things. He has killed. But he has fought his way out it. I am giving him another chance. Can't you give your dad one, too?"

Inside the Gym. Faith walked over to one of the weight benches. She had turned her back to Bourne, who just watched her move. He had decided to let her make the first move. He could see her open the box she had brought in with her, but not what was in it.

"Just to set the record straight," Faith said still not looking at Bourne, "you hit me. And no relationship with me can start like that. We're going to have to even the score a little."

With that, she turned and fired. All Bourne saw was a black pistol-looking thing before he felt two pin pricks hit his chest. Followed by 20,000 volts. As the pain subsided, he felt more than saw Faith looking down at him on the floor.

"Now, we're even," Faith said with a smile.


	10. Chapter 10

Part 11

"Was that really necessary?" Bourne asked from the ground, as soon as he could get his breathing under control.

"Yes, it was. I will not start anything with someone that has hit me," Faith said as she lent back against a weight machine while still looking down at the prone man.

"Well, big question for the big girl." Bourne asked, "What makes you think I want to be with you?"

"What?" Faith was a little floored, "But...You came back."

"My son is here. That's it," Bourne said, calm and cool once again. "You're his mother. But after what has been done to me, I still don't know you, and you sure as hell don't know me."

Faith stood there, her mind running wild with all her thoughts. Him leaving or staying. What she wanted. What she didn't want. What was right. What was wrong with her? Even when she had been evil and working for the mayor years ago, she knew why she was there. Now, within a few minutes, she was lost.

For his part, Bourne just stood there looking at her, his insides knotting. She had attacked him. He understood her reasoning, but he wouldn't stand for that. If he had a relationship with someone, it was as equals, not one where one or the other was always out for payback. Payback was not a thing to build anything on.

"I am not sorry for that," Faith said finally.

"An I am not for ANYTHING I have ever done," Bourne replied. "I have done a lot of bad stuff to a lot of people. And I don't feel sorry for any of it. Most deserved what happened to them. The others were just on the wrong side of things."

"Not even when you stunned me?" Faith asked, her voice carrying a hurt tone, and what was funny Bourne didn't know who it hurt more - her or him.

"No," Bourne sat back. "I'm not sorry for that either. You, your Council, your whole group, didn't even give me a chance to talk; they just attacked. I defended myself. I could have done a whole lot more. Within the first hour of being here, I had access to your Computers. All your agents files were open. I have your personal address. Family, friends away from this place. Phone logs. I know just about everything about all the major players here. Hell, I have what you watched on pay-per view for the last three years. I even found your old prison records. That cost a little money, but the files were still in the prison records. Hard copy only, in a back area. Your lawyer friends did good work, but no one can do everything. People always cut corners."

"So you're threatening me?" Faith asked standing up.

"God, woman!" Bourne almost shouted. "Someone doesn't agree with how you and your friends work, doesn't fit into what you think the world should be, and suddenly they're a threat? I got away from that when I left THEM. What next? Sit on my chest and choke me again?"

"No," Faith replied, looking at Bourne with fire in her eyes. "You throw out what you can do and how you could hurt us, and it's not threatening us? And digging up what happened a long time ago ain't going to help you."

"Faith," Bourne said, calming down, "you're right, I shouldn't tell you about not getting payback, then throw something like that out. But your group is like a workman with only a hammer: every problem looks like a nail. And it's how you all react."

"We don't," Faith said adamantly.

"Yes, you do," Bourne said, waving a hand in front of himself. "Example!"

"We thought we were protecting one of own, Xander," Faith said, nowhere near so sure of herself as before.

"Did you even think to ask?" Bourne asked. "You sat with me all night, we talked about everything. Not once did I lie to you. And you knew everything I said was true, and everything you told me was true." A pause. "Did you even think to come to me alone and ask what was going on? To see if I was on the level? Hell, if you read my file, I don't target people like Xander. He was a good guy, and I always went after the scum of the world. But no, you couldn't have read something, anything. No, you just wanted to hit something.

"So in you roared, like the Hell's Angels, to take me down for not being what you thought I was. And when I didn't just roll over, all you did was get bigger guns."

"Come on, you expect me to believe that you would have just come in if I had asked?" Faith asked unbelievingly.

"No, but we could have talked, no one would have been hurt, and then I might have came in. Or I might not have. But you didn't leave me any choice now, did you?"

"Come on, you had a choice," Faith said, but in her mind, she was starting to doubt herself.

"No, I didn't," Bourne replied. "I will never be used or controlled again. I have enough of that for the rest of my life."

Faith drew back, and for the first time, looked at it from Bourne's point of view. And wondered if maybe they were wrong.

"Maybe you're right," Faith finally told Bourne, biting her bottom lip.

"Ok," Bourne said rubbing the marks where the barbs from the stun gun hit him. "We're even. From now on, no more pay backs. I have done a lot of bad in this world, and will spend the rest of my days trying to make it right, whether you like it or not. And I want to get to know my son, and you, if you want me to. I have already talked to Willow and if you don't want to see me, you never will. But I WILL be in my son's life. Maybe I'll just be a shadow in yours. And that will be up to you. I've made my mind up about you and want to try and make it work."

"So if I don't want to see you, you'll just run around behind my back to see our son?"

"Yes, I want to spend as much time with him as I can. And no matter what you want, I will be in his life. But if you don't want see me, you won't. I'll visit with Willow and Alex, but you'll never have to see me again. And then only, if you want to see me."

"I want to." Faith paused, then said, "I won't keep you from our son. But it will be his choice. He's old enough to make up him mind on see you. I won't force the issue with him. But I will be pulling for you."

"Fair enough."

And for the first time, Bourne felt like he was making headway into a new life. The last time that had happened was the happy times on the Beaches with Marie. 


	11. Chapter 11

Bourne Again – final part

The mess hall of the school rang out with the noise of feeding Slayers and Bourne grinned a little.

Sixth months.

He had a home for six months.

The only snag had been Alex. And he was slowly coming around. Although he still didn't fully trust Bourne.

Not that Bourne didn't blame him.

But with Willow and Faith's help he was slowly becoming more and more accepting. And he would at least talk with him.

Bourne didn't think that he and the boy would fall into any father-son embraces, at least not anytime soon.

But it was looking up.

He had taken a job with the Council, training the Watchers-in-training in unarmed combat and working with Faith's retrieval teams and some of the younger Slayers, adding more of a edge to both.

He also worked with Landy. She could smooth over travel arrangements from time to time, so a team could get to places faster, and sometimes that was important.

It had come in handy just last month, in fact, when the Council had learned about an assassination planed out for a holy man in Iran. The holy man was one of the few that preached about non violence and talking with enemies to make them friends. And while his death would not have effected the world one way or the other, the identity of his assassin would. She was a Slayer.

The Slayer wasn't really a rouge. She was simply lost - born in a small village with no one to tell her who or what she was she was, and had been taken in by a local cleric. The cleric had used her to enforce his will on his followers. She had killed and would do it again.

Unless someone stopped her.

With the help of Landy and the CIA, Faith and her team were dropped deep in the mountains and, along with Bourne, they had moved in deeper. A few days later, the lost Slayer was in Cleveland and the holy man preached on about peace and love, never knowing how close he had came to death.

And the Cleric was gone, disappeared into the night.

That had been one of many jobs that Bourne had pulled for the Council. But he pulled them not because they wanted him to do them, but because they were right. Or at least more right than the ones he had been sent against earlier in his life.

The only snag he had lately was his son, Alex. Alex just had this grand ideal of who Bourne was supposed to be. And he really didn't match up. Real life never did.

It was slow going. But with a lot of help for the others, Alex was coming around. While they never had father-son things to do, they had started on possible friends things. But simply because of how their lives were, it was not the normal things. Instead, it was things like weapons training, hand to hand combat, evasions and observations training.

Soon, Alex was trained enough to take on a Slayer in hand to hand and at least break even. At least until he pissed her off, anyway.

But with ad-lib weapons training, he could win at least against one Slayer. Well, every now and then, he could. Against the young Slayers, anyway. Most of the older ones learned that anything was a weapon, but the younger ones would react with whatever training was worked into their muscles.

But they'd learn soon enough. And Bourne had taken it upon himself to train them. So every time his son would win, the girls had a little harder training the next day. And a few more girls would join his class.

So his life was better. He had a family. A lot more than he had expected a year ago. He had a mission that he believed in, and one that would help the world. Not just a country, or a few people in power. But everyone.

But, at the end of the day, he still didn't know who he had been: killer, assassin, father.

Now, though, he knew who he was.

And it wasn't just a name.

Jason Bourne, or Xander Harris - both were gone, but for differing reasons.

Harris had been murdered by the Government, while Jason Bourne was killed by a family's love.

And the world came to know the new man. One that took from both the past and present to make the future.

Xander Bourne.

Bourne looked across from his seat. There Willow sat with a smile on her face, and to his right sat Faith. With a mumbled hello, Alex joined them, his dark eyes looking over at his father.

The trust still wasn't in them.

But he knew it would come.

End.


End file.
